The Crystal Method: From Humble Beginnings to Iconic Longevity

Hey Coffee Drinkers! Ever wondered how some iconic artists maintain their longevity in the music industry? Grab a cup of coffee and join me as I chat with Scott of the legendary The Crystal Method. We dive into the creative process behind their distinctive sound, exploring the influence of Scott's upbringing, the music of his childhood, rave culture, movie scores, massive placements of their music in movies and video games, and so much more.

Discover how The Crystal Method went from humble beginnings working in a grocery store to their first record deal and collaborations with incredible artists like Tom Morello from Rage Against the Machine. We discuss the challenges of working as a now solo artist, and how scoring a film differs from creating their signature antagonistic, brooding dance floor tracks. Scott also shares some valuable advice for aspiring musicians, such as finding your niche, seizing opportunities, and surrounding yourself with people who support your vision.

As we wrap up our conversation, Scott emphasizes the importance of adapting, taking chances, and staying connected with your audience. He reflects on the secret to The Crystal Method's enduring success in the creative field and the key takeaways that can inspire and guide others in t own musical journeys. Don't miss this inspiring and insightful conversation with Scott from The Crystal Method.

WATCH ON YOUTUBE: https://www.youtube.com/thecrystalmethod

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GROUNDS FOR SUCCESS LINKS
All Links Here: https://linktr.ee/groundsforsuccess

AUSTIN SELTZER LINKS
All Links Here: https://linktr.ee/Austinseltzer

THE CRYSTAL METHOD LINKS
All Links Here: https://linktr.ee/thecrystalmethod

Transcript

Austin Seltzer: 0:01

Welcome to the Grounds for Success podcast. I'm your host, Austin Siltzer. Together we'll unveil the keys to success in the music industry. Join me as I explore my guest's life stories and experiences to uncover practical insights to help you align with your goals more effectively. Hey, coffee drinkers, I'm so stoked for you to listen to today's podcast I have on the Crystal Method. So if you like this content, if you like hearing about you, know, the behind the scenes on somebody like the Crystal Method or other guests.

Austin Seltzer: 0:44

Please like, follow and subscribe on whatever platform you're listening on. I want to be able to get this content to you as easily as possible and that would help me out a lot. On today's episode, we talk about so many different things but to give you a little idea of what's to come Creating a studio that allows for you to not always create the same track but to keep things fresh, So how to make a studio feel like you can come in and make unique ideas each time you step in. We also talk about how Scott likes to start new tracks.

Austin Seltzer: 1:22

We'll talk about how he always had music going on at the house whenever he was growing up, like the clash, zeppelin, pink Floyd, and he found a lot of his creative inspiration, like sonically, through the music that he would hear in the house at an early age. He also used Star Wars and other scores from films of the time to influence, like his creative play, so he would take like figurines and reenact scenes to music And this is really a lot of what shaped the sound that would be the crystal method, incredibly well known for having music and video games and movies. We'll also talk about how he loved to play air drums and how this really helped him hone in his rhythm and to play drum programming machines and whatnot in their music. We'll also talk about his bomb shelter studio, which I think is pretty cool. We'll talk about how they scored the picture and how that came about and some of the behind the scenes on how they went and did that. And we'll also talk most importantly, i think, about the almost 30 year span of the crystal method and how to go about having a career.

Austin Seltzer: 2:42

That's that long. So much insight into that answer. All right, let's get caffeinated. Cheers, scott, thank you so much for joining me. It's awesome to have you.

Scott Kirkland: 2:58

Austin, thank you so much for having me. It's great to be here. It's a beautiful setup you have here.

Austin Seltzer: 3:02

Thank you, thank you. Lots of love was put into that and I have to say, in love your way, you actually are drinking my black coffee and I'm stoked about that.

Scott Kirkland: 3:11

Yeah, you sent out the how do you like your coffee request and I told you how I like it when I'm normally going to places that the coffee is subpar or not as refined as what you've been kind enough to serve me today. So it's yeah. In the studio, in my studio, i have a guy there named Tobias, who he's gone through his growing hot peppers making hot sauce phase and he got into roasting his own coffee beans phase.

Austin Seltzer: 3:49

Really.

Scott Kirkland: 3:51

And he'd come over every once in a while with a superb cup of coffee. It's amazing when you because we're so inclined to just grab something whether it's at a Starbucks or it makes something at home, and you tend to try to cut it a bit, try to cut that bitterness, but it's quite something when you get ahold of a really nice cup of coffee. So I appreciate it. I expected something really wonderful and it's definitely meeting my expectations.

Austin Seltzer: 4:26

Well, hilariously, i also think of grounds as like ground floor. So if I were giving Folgers, we would be starting with the ground floor.

Scott Kirkland: 4:37

Or if it was like a sort of the hot one, sort of gradually start out with the shittiest cup of coffee and then get up to the spat out of a monkey's ass kind of whatever that stuff is, that have you ever tried that I have?

Austin Seltzer: 4:53

It's not great. It's not great. I don't think it's great.

Scott Kirkland: 4:59

It's very interesting decor you have in here. It's all the technical gear. You replace those with real candles and we could be transferred back and transported back in time in here. It's really great. So was this used to be like an overdubs in here and then you turned it into this, or is it just another kind of a storage area?

Austin Seltzer: 5:28

It was a storage area, more like a white prison cell, i can imagine. Yeah, it was just white walls, concrete floors, not the vibe at all. Yeah, but same with my studio room. It was the same exact thing, and then this wall was built and the opposite wall was built in the studio, so it was like I did a lot to make it feel like this.

Scott Kirkland: 5:52

Yeah And yeah, it feels very cozy and a vibe that I appreciate. I do have natural light in my room, but most of the time I keep it relatively dark. Yeah.

Austin Seltzer: 6:14

I found that creators love light. I'm a refiner. I do think I'm a creative, but I'm not creating and refining a mix or doing a master or whatever. I want straight lines. I don't want to feel the room, i just want to be in the sound, and so natural light is. I'm totally a vampire, which the room looks like there is a window right there, but you wouldn't be able to tell. No, if I opened it, though, we would no longer be in Victorian evaporate Yeah.

Scott Kirkland: 6:49

When my partner, ken, was still in the band, we bought this building and it sort of built our quote unquote dream studio and part of the one of the things on our checklist was having natural light. Because we had come from a studio in a little two car garage in La Crescenta where we made the first three albums four albums, four albums Yeah, the first three albums and where it was just a dingy, dark room where we were in the studio and we didn't have a lot of the creature comfort. So this building we had literally raised the roof so we can build this four panel shielded component window where we can independently control each of the shades. It's a cool, it's a great reveal when you're showing people the studio that once you're in the dark and all of a sudden the That sounds real good. Yeah, the things start to roll up.

Austin Seltzer: 7:54

I need to get one of those for long.

Scott Kirkland: 7:58

Unfortunately, i do have some leaks, but I think everybody over the last six months has found that their building is somewhat flawed when it comes to keeping the rain out, just because we've had so much. But yeah, it's a great building. I've been there, for we've been there for the past 16 years. So it would be great to go away for three months and just write down everything that I want and then come back and have it all implemented, because sometimes a room just becomes a prisoner of your own years and years of collecting, whether it's especially in a room where you have a building that has 25 plus years of the band And since I have the space, i just sort of hold onto it. But it would be nice to have one of those studio makeovers where you get a professional in there and HGTV.

Austin Seltzer: 8:58

Yeah.

Scott Kirkland: 9:00

Maybe that's the show that we should work on, the Pimp Your Studio. Yeah, pimp Your-. Yeah, it's a great space and welcome to come by anytime and check it out.

Austin Seltzer: 9:10

I'd love to see it. What kind of consoles were you guys working on?

Scott Kirkland: 9:14

Well, we started. I mean, we never had the money to go and buy a big, proper Neve or SSL or-. Our first three or four albums were made with just the Mackie 3208 with a 16 channel sidecar and which was really helpful to have that separate sidecar on the other side of the room with all the gear, different synths and another computer plugged into it and then be able to just route everything over. So it was very serviceable. It had the send and returns and eight bus and it was a great clean.

Scott Kirkland: 9:56

You know what you're getting with the Mackie stuff. And then, as we wanted to be able to recall things, we picked up the DBA or D8B or I think DBA did a little digital board that you could recall certain things. And then eventually, when we went to the Neve Studio, we went fully into Pro Tools and we were using their D-Command, which essentially became just a giant paperweight because, you know, because much of the it was more intuitive although it was more intuitive for Ken to because he was more of the engineer to use the dials and everything to EQ. But you know, but after a while you just mouse it or, you know, trackball it and-.

Austin Seltzer: 10:58

Oh, that's so quick.

Scott Kirkland: 11:00

And then, when it became to, you know, but it's still we still used it for fader movements and different things like that and but soon as he when he retired, and then I decided to sell that and I bought this Chandler and little it's a sidecar mixer because I wanted to get I wanted that analog sound, if you will, and even though I don't really use that much either, because it's again you get into recall and then and then when you have so many tracks you're just dealing with the latency and going in and out. But anyway, so but yeah, it's a it's a great room. I've had a lot of room for my various synths and it's the one I've been comfortable in. But I do find that it would I think it would be sort of a sort of a fresh a breath of fresh air if something you know were to happen in there. That would sort of change the room around a bit and give it a fresh feel.

Austin Seltzer: 12:17

Yeah, I talked with one of my guests about inviting chaos into your life, just like to break out of the cycle, break out of your norm, to be more creative. I think it's so necessary.

Scott Kirkland: 12:30

Yeah, and I find when I go to other people's studios it helps me get away from the mindset of also being the engineer, you know, running the board or running the computer. I could just sit in a noodle on a synth and then you know, listen on headphones and go how's this sound? Oh, that sounds cool. I could record that in and then, you know, do multiple takes of things like that.

Scott Kirkland: 12:57

I did that a lot more on the last album, the Trip Out, and to a certain degree on The Trip Home, where it was, you know, hooking up synths and getting a sound, getting something that inspired the rest of the, you know, the rest of the movement, the rest of the tracks, because it's very daunting to turn on.

Scott Kirkland: 13:21

you know, start fresh on a new song and you know you're not sure where to go. And so lots of times I try to remember the ways that we, when we didn't have the unlimited power of digital audio and computer processing power of like, oh yeah, that's right, we just kind of set up a synth and put it through a bunch of distortion pedals and got an early sound and jammed out on that for a while and then took whatever, you know whatever layers that were there and then fed that into a sampler and started cutting into it And that was the creative process. So doing that a bit more, as of late, does help kickstart things and kind of get you out of that that sort of you know that momentary, you know sort of during the headlights vibe that one can get when they're when they're staring at a blank canvas.

Austin Seltzer: 14:25

Yeah, yeah, for those listening and watching, this is this is somewhat deep in the weeds of production, which is great, and I want people to realize that. What you just said, i think, is it's like the very fabric of how to create. It's just like do the damn thing.

Scott Kirkland: 14:42

Yeah.

Austin Seltzer: 14:43

So you said, just dial in some distortion with guitar pedals which is really cool on a synth and just jam, yeah, and after a while something is going to click and you're like, oh shit, that little thing was cool. And then you put that down and you keep moving, put it in a sampler which, for those listening, it's just a way that you can take a section of what you played and played on keys, different notes, bend it, shorten it, make it ramp in trying to make this less technical, yeah, it's very much like you're just writing stuff down, writing notes down, writing paragraph, two paragraphs, three paragraphs And maybe, after further examination, only two of those paragraphs work.

Scott Kirkland: 15:26

You just sort of pull those out and then you can build around that. It's all about getting something flowing, something going, something in just, and that's something that sometimes that I have to remind myself of, especially when I'm in a room by myself where I'm just should I pull up one of the 15 to 500 different ideas that I've started over the last five years, where every once in a while I'm reminded of something that's worked on? that little idea And I do have success that way, like going through and just pulling something up and going oh yeah, this was something that I started, this might be good with this, and you have to kind of go through the archives a bit and sort of rediscover things that may be lost to another idea, another project.

Scott Kirkland: 16:29

But yeah it's a process, and one that I sometimes, remembering different ways that we've done things in the past, sort of help lead things that happen in the future.

Austin Seltzer: 16:43

Amazing. I would love to go all the way back to the start And this isn't the start of your career, this is the end, the start of your life. I would love to know some about your family growing up and how childhood, like things that you did in childhood and how you were raised, and kind of just trying to figure out the fabric of what sets you on this path.

Scott Kirkland: 17:16

Well, i was a latchkey kid. I was one. I'm only child, so my parents love music. Those are not necessarily connected, but but because there was always music in the house, i was always my mom loved. They were really young when I was born too. So so you know, and we're talking.

Scott Kirkland: 17:40

I was born in 1970, so as I was growing up, i grew up in the age of you know, of classic rock, progressive rock, disco, punk, metal, new wave modern music, electronic music and and, of course, rock was everywhere and so any age of MTV. So I was always around music and I started to find the things that I liked and then, being a latchkey kid, i was, you know, really into Star Wars and you know, if I could only imagine if Star Wars would have come out in an age where video was on demand, i would have burned through hundreds of hours of rewatching it and I think I probably would have become numb to it. Where, back in my time, you know, you had the score. So you had John Williams score which pretty much told the tale of the movie in sequential order. So you know, i had action figures and you know I'd put the score on and I would, you know, i would visualize through the score. So in a way that really helped me understand how I think about music and how, how it became like, especially in the kind of music we ended up making, it was very antagonistic, you know. There was like a here's the baseline, kind of setting the mood and all sudden here comes something else, some you know synth, that made its way in and stood out, and then there was a bigger synth There's always something bigger and then there'd be the chords and the fluff that would kind of change the dynamic of the track or change the mood of the track. And so you know again, that's very much like you know a score to a movie, where you know there's all this build up and tension and then you know then there's a release and so it. So making music was a real visual thing for me.

Scott Kirkland: 20:07

And then I, you know, i again I started to hear music in a different way and experience music in a different way, and I got really into rock and metal and I always wanted to play drums. It was always my, i felt, my I don't know it felt the most primal instinct to me was to you know to play drums. I love watching drummers. I love watching, you know, tommy Lee Twirl of Sticks and you know I love the action, the timing of it. I don't know if I would ever have been a drummer. You know I've been a drummer. You know I've been a drummer. You know I've been a drummer, the timing of it. I don't know if I would ever have been a good drummer, because you know you have to. You know air drums is much different, you know you never miss.

Scott Kirkland: 20:53

You never miss, you know, a hit when you're air drumming, and I would do that a lot and I would always want to drum kit. But my mom was not just reluctant, she was adamant that I would. You know that, because her brother was, you know, was in a band that they would play in the garage and all she'd hear, you know, is this shitty drumming through the walls. It was like you know, and she couldn't imagine having to go through that again, and so she pointed me towards guitar, which I, which, again, i also was fascinated with the that aspect of it you know the having you know an instrument and performing with it.

Scott Kirkland: 21:33

And you know, i was real, you know, driven by the sound of it and the different layers of it, and so I took guitar lessons, but I still would, you know, i'd go and I had one drumstick and a stick from the backyard and I would sit, you know, and I would air drum with headphones on in you know living room to various different Metallica and crew and all the different bands I was into.

Austin Seltzer: 22:07

And then damn what one second you? you were definitely. There's a lot of parallels to my story. I wanted, i definitely was supposed to be a drummer. You could see it by. I was an absolute professional pots and pans smacker but, just like you, and my mom was like absolutely not, i'm not getting a drum set. It's going to be noisy and loud and this and that, but what I was going to say is I was not drumming to shit, you were doing it to Metallica. I was just. you know, you can see it.

Scott Kirkland: 22:37

But what I did notice from the very beginning is that it helped me with my understanding of rhythm, or you know, getting in and you know, on a drum machine or you know being one that had to tap things out and play. You know, i didn't take piano lessons, i took guitar lessons for years, but then, soon as I discovered the Pesch Mode, i was like put the guitar aside. Not necessarily I didn't put it completely aside because I was still making music with guitars. When I met Ken, i had sampler and a little drum machine and a four track and a guitar and a synth. I think I must have said that.

Scott Kirkland: 23:21

But and so I love bands like New Order and Pesch Mode and still love rock and still listen to, you know I'd still listen to Heavy Metal or The Colt and different bands that had electronic elements or more rock elements, but they were all just blending of the world. So but I started to get more into, you know that, more electronic stuff. The guitar took it backseat, although on the first album, vegas, there's, you know there's a track like High Roller that has some guitar in it, that you know that I played. But again, I just didn't ever. I never had the necessarily the patience or the focus to focus on one instrument. Mainly. That came. My focus became on, like understanding how to put everything together in a DAW or work with. you know, the emerging world of making music with computers, which I was, which we were, 8990 and the very sort of you know beginnings of it. We had a Mac 2CI and an early version of Performer, which was everything, was all MIDI, you know.

Scott Kirkland: 24:43

You know staring at you know you know small little screen and rudimentary graphics, and and, but it was. It achieved, something that you know, that allowed us to move forward, and and so that was my focus over the years.

Austin Seltzer: 25:04

So yeah, well, i want to know when. When did you pick up the guitar, because it sounds like? is that the first instrument that you started to learn any kind of musical structure?

Scott Kirkland: 25:16

Yeah, yeah, but I was, I was my guitar teacher actually was. this is this very famous 80s rock star named Mark Slaughter, who was in the band called Slaughter And he was my guitar teacher before he went on to great success in those in the in the height of the 80s hair metal days. But I was, he was always into teaching me, you know, scales and and and although I did practice that stuff, i really wanted to just know what, what the riff was. you know, in a in a song.

Scott Kirkland: 25:58

That was sort of how I, you know, initially, sort of understanding you know that, that aspect of of making music, but it was really about just taking in all the things that I that I've, you know, i've learned and heard over the last you know, 40 years of. you know, at the time you know 15, 20 years of my life where I've just been a big, you know, fan of of music from all different genres And so and just really listening to a lot of music you know all the time. And so I would say, when we were making our first album, there were moments when I was like, you know, because we were all we were making music that was more club based or club that was rooted in. you know the electronic techno rave scene at the time. But we we understood that that you had to do like a typical track that we would enjoy in a club.

Scott Kirkland: 26:57

We'd come home and we'd go and buy that album or that 12 inch and come back and be like, oh shit, this thing is like five minutes of the same shit, we didn't realize that it's all about how the DJ manipulates it and how you blend and mixes, and so we we felt that, if we were going to have success, we would have to make something or create something that one can listen to in any environment.

Scott Kirkland: 27:22

It could be played in a club, it could be played in the car, it could be played, you know, on your, on your headphones and your Walkman or whatever was available at the time And it you know. So that was. So those that structure and of understanding how to put a song together, you know, was, you know, sort of rooted in the things that we both and Ken was a big lover of music as well And he had a different taste, he wasn't as much into the heavy metal stuff but but we both really loved public enemy and beastie boys and, and you know, and and you know everything, our how we understand how to create a track came from our shared love of, of, of music, and and then just understanding where we wanted to go and what we want to hear for in our own, in our own music. Once we got it done, I love that.

Austin Seltzer: 28:12

When did you meet Ken and how did you guys decide like we're going to do this? It was very random.

Scott Kirkland: 28:19

We were both working in the same grocery store. He's about eight years older than me, so I was in my late teens, maybe it was 20. I would say it was 1920. And I brought a drum machine into to work. So at grocery store you have like two 15 minute breaks. And so I thought, well, you know, i've, i'll, i'll. You know, i was really excited to to to play on this, this new piece of gear that I picked up, so I just brought it in. I was working on it, playing with it in the in the break room, which not something you normally see, you know, in in in that environment, somebody working on a little drum machine and with their headphones in a in a break room So he's like, oh, you make music.

Scott Kirkland: 29:05

And I'm like, yeah, yeah, yeah, i have a guitar and I write, you know written a couple songs, you know some lyrics and and. And he said, oh, okay, cool, well, i'm working with a singer. You want to come by and play me some of your songs? Maybe it might be good for the singer I'm working with. And so I was like, yeah, sure. So I went over and and he had a you know little apartment, he had a little setup in there And I brought my little gorilla ampere amplifier and my guitar and and and and you know he he had a little reel to reel. So he set me up with some and I just started, you know, playing the song and turned out it was, it worked well with the singer And then we started working with the singer.

Scott Kirkland: 29:49

Both of us started working with the singer And then, and then Ken eventually got a job working for producer out here in California And he moved we were both in Vegas at the time and he moved and got set up And then I would come every weekend or every other weekend we'd we'd work on music, but we also got to these raves that were that were happening underground events in Los Angeles and late 80s and early 90s, and that was where you know, we, you know, go into these rooms and be blown away by the energy that was created by, by, you know, a DJ playing records from different artists from around the world and the way that you know he was able to manipulate, manipulate those you know records and the environment, the, the, you know the.

Scott Kirkland: 30:43

You know you're in a dingy warehouse in the middle of you know CD downtown and you were, you know, in a room with five to 1500 people of ever different race and creed you can possibly imagine. And there was no tension, there was no aggression, we just were all there to to experience this singular moment And and it was really inspiring. So we have this gear that we were, you know, we thought that we were going to be produced, we were going to be like the white, jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, you know we were going to do remixes and work with and produce people.

Scott Kirkland: 31:21

But, and we had done that, we had found a studio with that that was in Hollywood, melrose and La Brea and and had already had a studio built into it. And it was, you know, this is 1991. It was $1,800 a month, which is like $4,000, $3,000, $4,000. I mean it's. It was crazy. We, you know, we burned through our savings real quick on that And you know, that sounds like a nice place back there, for sure.

Scott Kirkland: 31:50

It was. It was really great. And then things started to become a little bleak And I went back to work, deferred the grocery store that I was working with on in Vegas, and Ken took a job to working with various different production companies actually worked with rapper the Humpty Dance, humpty Hump or.

Austin Seltzer: 32:10

Oh, do the Humpty Hump.

Scott Kirkland: 32:11

Yeah, my mind is is failing me right now, but but they had a. He had a little record label label up in Santa Clarita And so he'd work in that. He worked, you know, engineered like some early Tupac stuff and and and and I, and then we just started to, you know, get our mojo back. We moved.

Austin Seltzer: 32:34

I got to interrupt there, So you went back to Vegas.

Scott Kirkland: 32:38

Well, no, i moved, no, we stayed in California, That company that that I was working for in Vegas. they came to California.

Austin Seltzer: 32:43

I see, okay Yeah.

Scott Kirkland: 32:44

The grocery store this, this grocery store called Smith's.

Austin Seltzer: 32:48

I see.

Scott Kirkland: 32:48

And I went. I was, i was working in the video department. They had a. This is back when they had little blockbusters inside this massive grocery store. So you know, one of the days I was working in the video store and I put on. You know it was like the dark crystal which I think I'd seen in passing, i can't remember, i didn't go to the movie theaters, but I put it on. And you know another world, another time, in the age of wonder, this, the crystal cracked and I was like, holy s***, take that, rented that, take that home. You know, hooked it up, sampled it And eventually, you know, became, you know the.

Scott Kirkland: 33:31

You know the lead, the intro for, you know Triple I Got You, which was, you know, the first track on our, in our, our album Vegas. So you know these little moments where you're, you know you're just doing what you're supposed to do and you're paying attention to the world around you, and we would continue to go out to clubs and continue to, to experience. You know what was happening in the, in the, the electronic rave scene at the time, and then things got a little bleak. You know, grunge kind of took over 92, 93, 94,. You know nobody was really paying attention to. You know which was basically disco at the time. You know, dance clubs with kids with big pants and lollipops and, and. But we continued to persevere and we continued to believe that you know we. You know we're on the right path And we made our first single called Now Is A Time, and it was released on the on the first release for this label called City of Angels, printed up 3,012 inches, and, and all those sold And we were like, wow, that's amazing.

Austin Seltzer: 34:39

And then we, we have to, we have to look into this. You're, you're skipping over some crazy cool things. So we first how did you get on a record label? Cause? so we, we went from you're in clubs and you saw how this music affected a room and you felt, you felt at home in that room. It was like everybody was just here to enjoy this music. in a dark, dingy room. You were inspired to no longer produce for other people, but now to be an artist. And how did we go from that moment to signing your first record deal?

Scott Kirkland: 35:16

Well, we put together a demo and we were introduced to a. I can't remember exactly how it happened, but somehow we got a small, really small production publishing deal with EMI. It was really small And in the end they made out really well from that publishing deal because they had they had a very good percentage of our publishing going forward for a certain amount of time. But they gave us $750 to basically find somebody to help us put this track out. We had a demo tape And then so there was an.

Scott Kirkland: 36:01

There was a herb magazine, which was a big local sort of lifestyle magazine based around the rave scene. That was run by Raymond Roker And it was, i think it was came out every couple of weeks And there was a classified section and there was an advertisement in there for starting up a record label looking for demos, 12-inch for this particular style of music. And we sent our demo in and we got a little bite from this company And then it went away And then we went down to we kind of had to move out of that one studio and started getting back to keeping our heads above water. And then we all of a sudden out of the blue, these two guys that were part of that. Other company reached out to us Justin King and Stephen Melrose to one. Stephen was from Scotland and Justin was from the UK and they'd been over in the US for a little while And they were like, really like this track, we want to put it out And we're like oh really That's amazing.

Scott Kirkland: 37:20

You know, so we. But we need two more songs. We need to fill out this 12-inch You need, so we did another remix. The first one was now. It's a Time to feature this sample for Martin Luther King Jr. Now is the time.

Scott Kirkland: 37:36

And you know. So we sampled that off of, you know, one of those speech albums that are out there, and then did a remix of that. And then we did the B-side, which was this track called Doublishes Groove, which was a down tempo, you know real groovy, kind of bubbly, kind of vibey synthy track that came out in 1994 on City of Angels, and but before that we moved back up from Orange County into a little studio, a little house, two car, the little two bedroom house. It was probably 1200 square feet if it was that, and it had a two car garage in it And it had a bomb shelter in the front yard.

Scott Kirkland: 38:21

That was buried in the front yard And so when we first rented yeah, when we first rented it was like a little sphere that was dropped into the ground. You know, 40 years prior And during the Cuban Missile Crisis, they were selling these bomb shelters in a day And so, yeah, so we thought, wow, cool, we would go down there and like maybe we could put an amp down there. You know, you know we think about what a bomb shelter could be. But it was completely dilapidated and you know, and broken down from years of small tremors and water damage And but we named our studio that we built. We basically took, got drywall, built this little enclosure inside this garage, you know, did the whole wall in front, put all our shit in front of it. So anytime we open the garage door, just look like oh my God, these kids look in this entire garage.

Austin Seltzer: 39:15

They're just full of shit.

Scott Kirkland: 39:16

But, and lo and behold, behind that wall was a little, you know, a little small little studio. That time That was genius, Yeah, and because it was in La Crescenta right, basically, the 210 Freeway was basically in our backyard, so we were never as loud as that semi truck coming by in the middle of the night, so we were able to, you know, make all the noise that we needed to make. And it was in a safe place because we, you know, we'd go out in the morning and, you know, go to breakfast after working all night, because we didn't have an air conditioner in our either, especially during the summertime.

Scott Kirkland: 39:49

You can only time you can work in this two car garage was like during the, during the night, and we'd go out there and we'd be people walking their dogs and, you know, water in their yards and be like Hey how's it going? We're just two guys just living in this little spot here, going to work.

Scott Kirkland: 40:04

And then we'd just go out and get some breakfast, come back and sleep and then you know, work throughout the night the next night, And so that first single now's the time sold the 3000 copies and then they were, like you got to do another one. So we had the sample from 1992 Democratic National Convention, where Jesse Jackson gets up there and, like you know, this big inspiring speech about, you know, keep up alive you know, there's hope.

Scott Kirkland: 40:31

you know there's all this stuff And we had recorded it you know VHS that and we were like, yeah, what if we use that? So we, you know, pulled that out of the archives and then sampled that and that came out with another you know B-side that was more down tempo And then we just that turned into the third single. And then in 1996, we local radio station in Los Angeles, the world famous K-Rock, had a DJ on during the drive time who was. his name is Jed The Fish and a mutual friend of ours connected us to him and he was wanting to build a studio. So he wanted to come by and check out our studio And so it was like 11, 12 o'clock in the afternoon. he was on from like two to six and so checked out the studio. We, like you know, gave him our track Keep Up Alive on vinyl And he called us up a few hours later says you want to hear what your song sounds like on the radio.

Scott Kirkland: 41:32

Oh man And we were like are you kidding us? And we were like, absolutely Yeah. So he had to. He said it. Later. He told us that he sweated cause he had to pull out the 12, he had to pull out the record player and you know, get it all set up And actually, well, drop the needle, for you know this prime time spot.

Scott Kirkland: 41:56

You know, jed, The Fish is catch of the day And we listen. I remember we'll never forget we listened to it on a little clock radio in our studio And it just sounded massive because of the compressors they use on those.

Scott Kirkland: 42:07

You know the radio stations, everything sounds great And so it just sounded. it just sounded freaking awesome And from that playing multiple people, including a really amazing individual by the name of John Seidel who was just was starting become. He was the first A&R guy for this new record label that was being put together by three really, really amazing people Andy Gershawn, who was smashing pumpkins manager, mark Williams, who was smashing pumpkins A&R guy, and a bunch of other bunch of other A&R. He A&R'd a bunch of other big acts. And then Scott Litt, who was a producer for like all the big R&M records and you know, the unplugged Nirvana album and he mixed he's mixed a bunch of things And they were starting a label, record label called Outpost, And John Seidel heard that. He heard Keep Up Alive on the radio that day and was like we need to sign these guys.

Austin Seltzer: 43:17

Holy crap, wait. I wanna highlight some stuff real quick. That is just wild, because I'm pretty sure you guys started in 93.

Scott Kirkland: 43:26

Well we started the first thing that we ever, the first thing that ever came out was 94. Two things happened that year. That little publishing deal that we signed was that Help Get A Sink, and there was a movie called Species. That was this sci-fi movie with a really pretty girl who's basically an alien, who's going around killing a bunch of guys, having sex with them and killing them. You know it was a big production at the time, had Ben Kingsley and a bunch of other people in it and through that connection, through the, an early version of Keep Up Alive was synced into that movie. So that was like a good. I mean, i think that bought like a bunch of our gear.

Austin Seltzer: 44:18

But you guys didn't come up with the name until like 93, right, well, actually in the name.

Scott Kirkland: 44:25

The name was sitting on a chalkboard for back of probably 92, because when we were still, when we were thinking about at that time, like we were still working as producers, but we were thinking about like writing, working on our own stuff, and so there was a rapper that we were working with that said the name and, passing, said, oh, the crystal method, referring to this, you know, mode of transportation that we were gonna you know, there's a girl, crystal that's gonna give us a ride to this club. Oh, the crystal method. Oh, we were like, oh, that sounds cool, like right that up on the board. And so when, so that sat there on the board. And then when we, when we started to make our own music and we started to get we had this small publishing deal and we had a sink in this, we were meeting, we met with one manager and the first thing he like remember we went to a nice restaurant and we sat down and he's like, yeah, your demo tape's awesome.

Scott Kirkland: 45:25

You know you guys are, you know really think there's something going on, but you gotta change your name. And there's not, you're never, there's not gonna be, there's not gonna be a radio station that's gonna play your music, cause your name is too, you know, controversial. And we were like, really, that's what your, that's your first thing you're gonna, you know, tell us. And we were like, you know, you're wrong, you know, our name is freaking killer, like it. At the time, our big market, we thought, was the UK, and they didn't know what the drug was, and even at the time the drug was a big deal. But we just, you know, we were always making it's all the crystal healing and we had all these different meanings for the name And yes, there was drug connotation, yeah, there was a drug connotation there, but it's really about, you know, the three words.

Scott Kirkland: 46:18

They just sounded, you know, they flowed and they, and at the time, like a lot of bands, were naming themselves after piece of gear. You know, the prodigy was named after Mug synth and the Juno reactor and 808 state And there was all this, you know, and you know we. But we just thought it was different And so we, you know, we, stuck with it. I don't know if we could. You know, i don't think we can get away with it now. I don't know if. You know, i don't know if we were. You know, nobody's gonna be called the fentanyl method.

Austin Seltzer: 46:50

You know it doesn't really flow off the tongue but I think that's why, yeah, but yeah, but at the time it was, it was you know it was, it was in and we were coming from the rave scene and it sort of it stuck And so so, yeah, this thing just started to, you know, snowball and Yeah, i want to highlight something for everybody that I noticed early on in your story And you also actually hinted at, is that I think one of your superpowers is that whenever an opportunity or something presented itself, you always leaned into it.

Scott Kirkland: 47:29

Absolutely.

Austin Seltzer: 47:29

Whenever you heard the crystal method I mean it just resonated. You wrote it down. Whenever You were at that live show in that warehouse, You felt that this was something and you leaned into it. Whenever you got that first pub deal, you you were like this is a great opportunity. You leaned into it. It it sounds like your North Star has always guided you in a direction that that took you to where you are.

Scott Kirkland: 47:56

Yeah, and it wasn't always. You know it wasn't always easy and it wasn't always. There wasn't always, you know, a reward at the end of it that that we again, like when we first released our track now, as a time, you know we were, we were never gonna see any of that. Maybe we got a $1,500 signing bonus or something like that. But you know these are albums 12 inch vinyl, that were, you know, limited to 3000, that were going out to DJs, you know, around the country and you just keep, you know, moving forward, to keep, you know, you move in. That It's not about the, you know, it's not about the numbers. It wasn't, you know, it wasn't about, you know, the likes or anything of that nature for us at the time, i mean, and it was about, you know, just doing the work, keeping a positive, you know, outlook on things and and and and, pushing forward, making, making, taking every opportunity and again, that that continued.

Scott Kirkland: 48:58

The reason why I'm still sitting here in front of you 25 years later is that, you know, after Vegas came out and was successful and went on to sell a million albums, things that our manager always pushed us to do, things that weren't in our coverage zone. So you know, at the end of that tour we were on family values tour with like corn and filter and and you know Limp biscuit, you know playing in front of real Heavy rock kids, that you know we're like initially sitting there with their feet, you know, middle finger up in the air, and by the end We're like they would come up to us and you get a kid with the limp Biscuit shirt come up to us and goes, oh my god, that was fucking pretty good dude. I haven't hurt you guys before, but that was fucking rad.

Austin Seltzer: 49:39

You know, well done, you know like you guys brought the fucking energy Yeah yeah, we, you know, we brought the.

Scott Kirkland: 49:43

You know, we, we wanted to, we didn't, we did nothing but live shows. So we, you know, we'd spent the money on, like you know, bringing out all the, you know, the lights. We had a really amazing, you know, lighting director named Laurence upton, who, who worked with bands like smashing pumpkins and beastie boys and Marilyn Manson, who understood how to do, you know, do a rock show, and so he backlit us and we, you know, we started out with eight strobes and we went to 16 strobes and then, you know, we had a show with 128 the strobes.

Scott Kirkland: 50:13

Oh my god we're, we're, you know we're. You know it's like you know we'd have to start posting things in the lobby. That you know. If you're sensitive to light, you know, you, you know, be careful, because we were, you know, at some point we were losing people during it's for this track out. They portrayal like right, when would we reveal this? You know this. These strobes were like I Think somebody just passed out over there.

Scott Kirkland: 50:34

So we were able to really, you know, cultivate this, this vibe that we were the people's Band, if you will, and again, and and they're one of the greatest Joys I get from, from meeting those people that supported us through those years is Just like that kid that came up to us at the show in the family Valley show in Pixburg or Columbus or wherever we were playing like we were the bridge, we were the bet, we were oh I, you know, i was only I was only in hip-hop, or is only only only in the rock. But I heard your, your band, and it was like oh.

Scott Kirkland: 51:12

I like this electronic music, i like the vibe of this and then that that I mean we were. You were the first electronic band We ever listened to and we've we discovered his whole other world because of your music. There's two and a half years, three years later, we were like We gotta get back in the studio.

Austin Seltzer: 51:27

We got we would.

Scott Kirkland: 51:29

We were in the studio, we would do things, but we were just, you know, we were just, you know, we were kind of exhausted from being out the road a lot, and so we'd come back and work for a little bit And then it, well then it was like, okay, how do we, what do we do? How do we? you know we, we were, we couldn't just go back and make Vegas 2.0. It was not, it wasn't you know we. It would have been Disingenuous, and it would have been It wouldn't it? we couldn't capture the magic of that, and so we started thinking of it as like, what do filmmakers do? what up, you know what? how do we just Find something else that we really like? and so we leaned into the rock stuff that we were. That we really, you know, we really enjoyed, you know. And Tom Morello from Raging against Machine We'd heard through a friend that he really liked our stuff, so we reached out to him, you know, we took a chance and we're like, hey, is that true? you?

Austin Seltzer: 52:28

dig us and he's like you know Who knows.

Scott Kirkland: 52:29

He might have been thinking about the Kemblebee brothers at the time, but he was like yeah, yeah, where you guys where you guys at.

Scott Kirkland: 52:34

He's like oh yeah, we got a little studio and like lacrosse enter. It's like you know it's not the, you know it's not a I mean he's used to going in the real studios, you know. He's came, he like slipped his way out to the lacrosse enter and and and brought his amp in and Wasn't like what a dump. This is what it was, you know. It didn't have any of that rock star bullshit and like he was like Let's make some music.

Austin Seltzer: 53:01

I love that, because that's that's Rage's brand. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Scott Kirkland: 53:05

Yeah, yeah, he set up his amp in the kitchen and, like you know we were by that time, we did have a air conditioning We had. We had a window air conditioner that we and it was so ghetto, we like we had a our friend put together like a little tube Venting system to where we, you know, we did able to take the window air conditioner, the the cooling that came out of that and we had this thing all taped up and it was just super, super ghetto and but.

Scott Kirkland: 53:34

But you know it did the trick and you know, and we did. You know the next, we did Vegas there, we did tweak in there, we did Legion of boom there and, yeah, we, we made the most of it and, and and move forward.

Austin Seltzer: 53:51

I want, i want to ask some questions, though, about some of these sinks, because I I'm thinking about, like, of course you guys make, have made great music, but like what actually made you guys iconic and really cut through. And I was thinking about it Whenever you said, like we don't have a BBC, one radio that can just make a whole nation listen to a song. We don't. But you guys had sinks, and I mean you had the Matrix trailer, right, like the first no, we weren't in the Matrix trailer.

Scott Kirkland: 54:27

I a lot of our music, we, we were up for a Matrix stuff but we didn't get it. But we were, but we, we were in the, we were the born, the, some of the born trailers We were. Blade was a big one, there was. There was some other things that we also, but the biggest sink that we ever got was Well, first there was a I can't remember which one came first, but it was them.

Scott Kirkland: 54:50

There was a Mazda Miata ad that had high roller in it And it was, as you know, mazda Miata going across like the flat desert with the, you know the, the, the heat Blooms coming off of it and you know this really cool, you know aggro, our Pigeon part, and and you know and. And. Then the other one was There was a gap ad that had busy child in it and and it was like summer of Winter of 97. Here you have this ad that's on, you know, during Seinfeld and During friends, this big gap ad that that was this being played. So then that started to really, you know, to take hold. The song was really recognizable.

Scott Kirkland: 55:35

And then that radio, then radio stations like K-Rock and the end and HFS and and and DC and FNX in Boston started to, you know, adding, added the song into rotation. And here we're here, a track with, you know, just a vocal sample, and no singer was being played. You know, in the middle of you know, nirvana in Stone Temple Pilots, so, and then we started to do radio Festivals. I'm still still remember that moment. We're like let's go kick ass, let's get out there And let's listen. You know not, let's not be apologetic that you know we're different or we're not the same. We're gonna go out there and we're gonna fucking do our thing and and and we you know, maybe, again, you know, you just went over, you win people over.

Scott Kirkland: 56:25

You win people over with an attitude that that, you know, is like. You know We belong here and you know, and take that opportunity and make the most of it And and so we did a lot of those. Our manager, richard, was really you know. He came from a rock background and he understood That world and I remember, you know the, i remember being another moment, i remember being in his office when we were about to release Vegas and goes this is gonna sell a million albums And we're like what are?

Austin Seltzer: 56:54

you talking about Wow?

Scott Kirkland: 56:55

We've only sold, like You know, five thousand vinyl. You know, before this and goes, we're gonna you this album is, is, is is amazing, and and, and I believe if you guys work hard enough and you You take every opportunity that's in front of you, this is, this is eventually gonna sell a million albums and we're like, okay, let's do it. That's and you know and and you know it's so, but it's again It's like doing the things that you know, that maybe you know.

Austin Seltzer: 57:28

I mean we had.

Scott Kirkland: 57:29

You know we were doing like You know, tamp on commercials, or we weren't playing. You know Events where we felt that it didn't fit our brand. I mean our brand was, you know, two guys from the same world you're from and then we just, you know, we, we've found our way and and and we were also. We always like, when we perform, we always pushed our gear right to the front of the stage. We weren't hiding anything.

Scott Kirkland: 57:52

You know, like this is there's pedals on the ground And there's my got my Nord over here and we had all these DX7 twos that were all you know MIDI. You know they're middied up and I would, you know I was super aggressive moving around and Ken was, like you know, you know, kind of Initially like fine-tuning the. The sounds like oh, here's. You know you can hit the delay here and you know, carving out some of the EQs for for some of the things that we're playing, but For the most part we were just, like you know Too, normal guys that you know that have that appreciate. You know rock and electronic music and this is our fusion of it and you know I hope you like it.

Austin Seltzer: 58:33

We know you're gonna like it.

Scott Kirkland: 58:34

We know you're gonna like it because it's like, because we like it and we love it. So we've we. We were confident that you're gonna love it as well. Yeah.

Austin Seltzer: 58:41

I mean that's, that's beautiful. I think that that that I hope for people listening if they're an artist or a singer Or a producer or whatever lean into that collaboration or take this as a sign, like if they've been thinking about I should. I should just Let these things come to me and say yes whenever it makes sense, obviously, but like, don't be so precious of your sound that you, you Remove this cool collaboration. That could happen.

Austin Seltzer: 59:08

Yeah and I think that from the sinks that you've mentioned Plus we haven't talked about I mean, you guys have been in so many different video games To I. I think that to my point that was making before of Maybe we didn't have this a DJ that could really televise a track everywhere. I think that you guys found your fan base like you. Tell me if I'm wrong, but I feel like Yolce Fanbase is very much like the nerddom world, like people who love video games, dark video games, people who love darker movies, people who are like die-hard fans because they associate you guys with great times in their life that maybe have come through some kind of video format.

Scott Kirkland: 59:52

Well, to your point, one of the biggest moments when we back in 98, when we did a sync for the biggest global video game of the time was FIFA, and so you know you had Busy Child, keep Hope Alive, and I think now is the time synced into this video game that you know you couldn't help but hear the music. It was like I think there might have been a thing you can turn it off. But also in that same game was song number two from Blur, which is the biggest, you know, one of the biggest sync songs on the planet, and there was a couple other ones that were really globally big tunes and you know hear three of our songs. And so you know we also did a video game called N2O, which where we Dude, I used to play the shit out of that game.

Scott Kirkland: 1:00:46

Yeah, where we did all of our music. It was only us, so we used remixes and different things and it was an epic game. And we did a tour, the N2O tour, which I didn't know. You were a fan of that game, i still. I came across a very limited supply of the original stickers from that era.

Austin Seltzer: 1:01:06

Oh yeah, dude, I Yeah my friend growing up. I didn't have a PlayStation, he did, i had the N64 or I had an older Nintendo at that time. So I'd go over to his place to play pitch black in the room and loud as fuck speakers just so we could jam out And I see where you're.

Scott Kirkland: 1:01:25

Yes, you like to pitch black? That's Yeah, yeah.

Austin Seltzer: 1:01:28

And his TV was backlit. It was quite a big screen, but it was backlit, which I mean that's just not a thing anymore. Obviously It was like a projector projecting into it, and so if you had a pitch black room you could see much better.

Scott Kirkland: 1:01:42

Oh, wow, yeah, Just the experience. Oh, yeah, yeah, i imagine. So, yeah, yeah, without a doubt, the video game world was huge, especially in those early years. That's not, they're not going there for the music, but the music's in there, and that's something that, without a doubt, propelled us even farther, because, you know, again, you just got to find a way to get people to hear you, and then that's where they can make the choice for themselves.

Austin Seltzer: 1:02:11

Yeah, that's beautiful. I want people to understand that there are just so many different ways to make it as an artist or to get to your fans. Just don't cut yourself off to really cool opportunities that may come. And that leads me to How did you get into film scoring? Because I think that that came along, or at least you guys making soundtracks to full films, right.

Scott Kirkland: 1:02:36

We did a couple of things and we were just doing syncs and maybe we do a change of, maybe an edit or something that was different for a sync, and then we just started. People asked us to do certain things and we just said, yes, to do so, yes, a lot, and I think it would have continued on if, if Oh sorry, hey, honey, hi, can you get me? I can't get you right this minute, but I will be able to get you soon. Okay, where are you at? I'm at the police. Can you hold there for 45 minutes? Yeah, okay, all right, thank you, bye, my daughter, my dad, calling in her dad Uber service. But yeah, so we did that almost human show. It would have gone on farther, but it was a big. It was a Warner Brothers produced show that was on. That was a JJ Abrams Bad Robot production that was on Fox And I think there was just. It cost a lot to make, but it was very cool, especially because we were just kind of on our own.

Scott Kirkland: 1:04:01

We didn't have those notes where you, where you? Okay, on this scene I want tension. I don't want it to wrap up too much until it gets to this spot right here. Then I want the relief with some chords and something. Were you really getting serious notes?

Scott Kirkland: 1:04:18

It was just like we like what you do. Just do more of that. It's something that I. It's not my comfort zone, but it's one of those things that I did like because, again, when I get, when I reflect back on staring at an empty canvas, here was something to follow. Here There's a ship that's coming across here and there's a fight that breaks out here and then there's tension here and then there's a relief and then, and so you're like, okay, i've got a blueprint to work with something that to follow, and I did like that aspect of it Go with the flow, follow the directions, follow the scene, do what you can to help the scene along and to be a servant to the picture, rather than, in the past, just doing something for yourself or doing something in the name of the crystal method. This was like you got to serve the scene.

Austin Seltzer: 1:05:26

Yeah, scratching a different itch for sure It was fun.

Scott Kirkland: 1:05:29

I did like it and I do appreciate it And I will. There are some other things that hopefully in the come up in the near future that will allow me to scratch that itch, as you said, that's awesome, and that's what we were talking about earlier.

Austin Seltzer: 1:05:45

throw a little bit of chaos in there and I'm sure that you learned some really cool things and you bring it over to the crystal method. And also there's this beautiful full circle moment that you're giving to your child self. whenever you're listening to John Williams or whoever and you were listening to a score that made it up a world You're fulfilling that little prophecy for yourself. I think that's kind of beautiful.

Scott Kirkland: 1:06:10

Yeah, it is. It's still. Every bit of this journey has been something that I reflect back on. I remember moments being on stage and thinking like having flashbacks of the kid that was playing guitar in front of the mirror, trying to imagine what it would be like to create something that had that moment for and so far out of reach. You can't even again, it's all fantasy. But then have the fantasy fulfilled through not a hit, the lotto moment. It's more of a grinding it out and putting in the effort and belief in oneself and focused on moving forward one moment at a time, doing the best you can and not taking anything for granted.

Austin Seltzer: 1:07:19

That's beautiful. Well, so I want to fast forward until now, or roughly now. What does it feel like creating just on your own? It's just you now. You touched on it a little bit earlier, but I want to know the differences, other than just you noodling around and then now you have to change the hat. Is it more fulfilling in certain ways and less fulfilling in others? I just want to know the differences.

Scott Kirkland: 1:07:51

Well, ken retired and said I want you to continue on and do your thing and I'll be your biggest supporter. I took that as being an opportunity for me to understand the legacy of the band, but also take it in my own direction. There was some moments of yes, there's not going to be that tension that sometimes happens when you're working with another person, where sometimes you get carried away in the moment and you're like, no, i like this for well, fuck you. then We were both of us very opinionated, very strong willed. So there was a yes, there wasn't going to be that.

Scott Kirkland: 1:08:52

But out of that comes something I think better than my ideas wouldn't have been anything without Ken, and Ken's ideas would have been yes, we could have individually done great things, but collectively we did something even better. So I do miss that part of it and I do collaborate with people. I do send things to people. What do you think of this? Because I really relied on Ken. you're going to like this, because then he comes in and he goes. that's awesome. And then he starts to take over and works off of that like a baton That he's going to loop this lap and come back around. I'm going to grab it in a minute, but, wow, it's nice to have somebody else take this idea further.

Austin Seltzer: 1:09:49

You're a collaborative spirit.

Scott Kirkland: 1:09:53

I think that I need that as a collaborative spirit, that working with someone that can give you notes and can tell you let's lose that section. Oh really, oh yeah. Well, i just spent three days on that section, but you know what? You're right, let's do something better. Or just somebody giving a different perspective. So initially I took the challenge and I ran with it and I enjoyed sort of being a solo artist, if you will, but at times it became a little daunting and it became like I just need to hear some feedback from somebody else. So I do have a group of friends that I collaborate with and other people that I'm meeting.

Scott Kirkland: 1:11:00

This last album I worked with David Martinson, who goes by the name of Val VAL, who is just like wow, you're just so creative and you think outside the box. I G or YouTube, we would have been filming all those little moments that happened, although that might have been distracting. So anybody who can post and still be productive without overthinking the post, that's a world that is a challenge for me. Those people that can think in that way or have a setup that allows them to live in that multiverse, if you will, of social media and the creative space, i find fascinating, but I'm happy to be able to lean on the things that Ken and I did together. I do still hear him, his voice and good and bad in my brain sometimes when I'm doing the in there by myself.

Scott Kirkland: 1:12:23

But I chose to embrace the opportunity and then reach out to kind, like-minded individuals who like to create music or create something without drama. Ken and I did some fucking amazing things and it's given me this platform to continue on as the band And although I do miss him greatly at different times, i've come to the point now. It's been six years since he retired, seven years since he retired, so I'm happy with the opportunity that I have and make the most of it is my goal on a daily basis. That's beautiful, but actually some days I get distracted by life, family, and my daughter doesn't give up crap about dad being productive in the studio.

Austin Seltzer: 1:13:23

She's like.

Scott Kirkland: 1:13:23

I need a ride. come pick me up. I'm like okay, annie, i'll see you soon. So although I did plan on going back to the studio today, i could still do that later. but it's nice having this other life that takes me away from the studio every once in a while and gives me a distraction. And so I'll be back in the studio tomorrow, then going out this weekend to do a show in Asheville, north Carolina. So Hell.

Austin Seltzer: 1:13:53

yeah, i know there are questions about a question about continuing forward, but I want to ask you this big question of what does success mean to you? I'm really curious.

Scott Kirkland: 1:14:07

Success. Well, success has met to me. I'm grateful for the life that's given me, that I've been able to wake up every day, make music for a living, and although at times you get frustrated with that what that means. Success means that you've got to. Somehow. It's like a balloon that needs to be blown up a little bit Every once in a while. You can float around the room for a while, but you're eventually going to have to give it a little bit of life or give it a push, and so it's been a blessing to be able to have this life and to have made, created something that has somehow found its way into another person's life.

Scott Kirkland: 1:15:22

But success is something that you can't take for granted. So it will give you lots of highs, but it will also put you in a situation where you feel like you've got to continue to work, because there's a thousand artists every day discovering themselves in their bedrooms, in their basements, noodling on a computer or playing on a piano or opening up a DA with the thought and process of I want to create. And so every day, there's thousands of kids that discover that this is what they want to do, and I'm in a situation where I get to do that. So don't forget that, continue to grow and don't take anything for granted.

Austin Seltzer: 1:16:20

Thank you, that's a great answer. I think I want to end off on something that I think the listeners and viewers could really learn from, especially if they're artists. But I really just think, like any creative field whatsoever, you're in a unique position where I think this is the 30th year that you guys are creating music together.

Scott Kirkland: 1:16:44

I always thought that the movie Species came out in 93, but I think that was the track that was in. The movie came out in actually 95 or 94. So official release, the first one ever being now is a time which came out in 94.

Austin Seltzer: 1:17:08

So next, year will be the 30th anniversary.

Scott Kirkland: 1:17:10

Yes, next year will be the 30th anniversary.

Austin Seltzer: 1:17:11

Okay And I want people to know, and I'm really curious, how, how can we all stay in, whatever industry you create a field we are, for that long and continue going, cause you're playing shows this weekend and you're doing festivals this year How can people have the longevity and art like you have?

Scott Kirkland: 1:17:38

It takes, just like if you ever watched the construction site.

Scott Kirkland: 1:17:41

You just, you know, one day at a time, you know one day you gotta put the pavement down and then and you know, it just doesn't happen overnight.

Scott Kirkland: 1:17:50

You have to work, hopefully, have a group of people like I've had surrounding me for the last 25 years, plus 30 years almost where they have your interests in mind and give you great advice and help, nurture and protect and steward your. You know your ideas and your creativity. And if you don't have those people, then jettison them and find people that do you have your best interests in mind. And then you know you gotta continue to evolve and you gotta continue to move forward for the good end of that. And so, and then you know, don't be afraid to take chances, don't be afraid to fall on your face, don't be afraid to to disappoint, because you gotta turn the page and move forward. And what really I think it allows me to continue to do these shows and festivals and tour and still make music is that you have to make a connection. There's no one more excited to be there than I am.

Scott Kirkland: 1:18:58

I go up on stage and then I'm like you know, I've become a completely different thing, and I'm combustible and I'm I know what it feels like to go to a show and watch somebody that doesn't feel like does that person only wanna be here? Like are they having any fun doing this?

Scott Kirkland: 1:19:17

Like yeah, i mean, i'm intense and I'm like really like in the moment, And you know, and then soon as the show's over, i'm back you know, i'm like but I go, you know, and I, instead of going back in the dressing room and like going, yeah, fuck, that was awesome show, i just I get to, i go into the crowds and I talk to people and I get these stories and I take pictures with people and, yes, it's very, it's kind of like, oh you're, you know, you're just living in that moment.

Scott Kirkland: 1:19:47

And, yeah, because our music has lived in their moments and they get to share these moments with me, think about the future, but be accountable for your energy and the opportunity you get in that moment when you're on stage or when you're meeting someone, or how do I think like that 20 year old kid that was really hungry and you know, it's something that I work on and how to reconnect. But be grateful, i'm really grateful for everything and I'm excited to get into the studio tomorrow. And if I do, and when I do, make the most of it. And if, at the end of the day, i don't accomplish my goals, well then, lick your wounds and come back the next day and keep trying, keep punching.

Austin Seltzer: 1:20:38

Yes, i'm grateful for you saying that and for you being here, and if you want to give us some final words and explain your quote over there, that you chose. Oh, yeah, you probably For those like listening. This is I guess this is going to be the second episode out. I have a chalkboard here that I have people write on if they're not visually watching, but so we have a chalkboard and there's a quote in Well, it's a quote.

Scott Kirkland: 1:21:03

I can't remember where the quote, it might've come from, a movie or a TV show. It's two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do. And I just found it to be like taking that, saying two wrongs don't make a right, and just flipping it around a bit. Or, if you think of it in a different way, yeah, you may be making wrong turns or making wrong decisions, but eventually, enough of those will get you going in the right way. So two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do visually get you going right is one of those things that I just I thought it was a fun plan, words and something that I, when you asked me to put something up there, that's what I came up with.

Austin Seltzer: 1:21:58

I mean that is perfect for this podcast. That's really what it is fail forward. Keep on just trying just moving forward and fail.

Scott Kirkland: 1:22:08

And then when the floor does fall from beneath you, you're not wallowing that pit, you gotta find your way out of it. And then that gives you the confidence to avoid falling in that hole again, or at least when you go down you can get out of it quicker.

Austin Seltzer: 1:22:32

Yeah, thank you. That's perfect way to end this Cheers.

Scott Kirkland: 1:22:37

Thank you so much for coming.

Austin Seltzer: 1:22:42

Cheers.

Austin Seltzer: 1:22:43

Thank you so much. Cheers, cheers, cheers. All right. So now that you've listened to this episode, i am certain that you've taken away so many different key points from what Scott had to say about his career, the crystal methods you know, career in video games and film and touring and almost 30 years of experience. From this episode I took away several key points that I'd like to highlight here. So one of them is to create. You have to start, and that seems so common sense. But if you don't just noodle around and play and you know kind of be in the sandbox with a synth, a guitar, your voice, whatever you never get to just be in the mode of creation. If you sit down with an end goal in mind, chances are that you're gonna get lost trying to get there. But if you just have fun, like he said, plug a synth into guitar pedals and distort it and just like play and noodle around, eventually something is going to happen. That's really cool And it's your job to just be able to know okay, this is a thing, this sounds cool, let's run with this. You know I can't help you with that part, but getting started is the key. Secondly, his parents always having played music in the house is just a recurring theme that I'm hearing with my guests. You know, at an early age we're just so impressionable on whatever is played around us, and the ability to just absorb whatever your parents are playing and have it channel through what you later create just seems to be a thread that goes through most of these guests. Number three I'd love to highlight this, and whenever he said it it made so much sense to me. But finding your niche is so important. But even more than that, where is there a hole in the market? And what I mean by this is whenever Scott talked about the crystal method. Whenever they went to a rave at a warehouse downtown LA, they heard DJs playing out music in a room that was black, you know dark, and everybody was just happy and excited to be there, no bad feelings at all, it was just moving to the music. But then they went home and they tried to get those same records and play them at home and just hear them over their sound system. They couldn't find these club mixes. So instead of just going to the raves to hear this music, they decided why don't we make that music but then add their touch, which is aggression and this like antagonizing force in their music. I just thought that was huge And I think that a lot of people could implement. That Brings up a point in my mind, actually, that I heard Rick Rubin say that you know he would used to go to places and listen to people rap and spend vinyl, but rap and the aggression and the feeling that he felt in the club could not be heard on records And that's why he sought out to make that kind of music with artists. So great parallel there.

Austin Seltzer: 1:26:09

Find your true fans Again. Maybe an obvious thing, but what the crystal method did so well is early on they started to get sinks and these cult, what would become cult classic type movies or nerd kingdom you know nerddom fandom world, where we're talking about video games and sci-fies and thrillers and just he said FIFA and Spawn and all these movies that just have like this cult following. They never didn't service these fans. Continuously on their mind They were like how do we service those fans more? How do we keep on giving them what they want? And you know a lot of people think that that's not the way to go about making music. But I never understood why it was wrong to give fans what they want. Keep giving the fans what they want. They love you for that And I think the crystal method did that incredibly well.

Austin Seltzer: 1:27:10

Another huge point Whenever science in life show you that you know here's an opportunity and it may seem difficult to make that choice because you're giving up on something else, or it's just a tough choice in general, or an opportunity presents itself but you're not looking for you so you don't see it. What Scott did so incredibly well and you can hear it in this podcast is that whenever an opportunity showed itself, he realized it and he leaned in. And of course, i'm sure there were times that he didn't, but you can hear all the times he did and how it took him to where he is. Lastly, i think this is such a great point, but to have a 30 year career, or almost a 30 year career, surrounding yourself with people who continuously push you to be better at what you are day after day is, it seems to be the answer.

Austin Seltzer: 1:28:11

Whenever somebody is holding you down is not helping you move towards your goals. You have to get rid of them. You have to remove them from your team. We have to be as lean and mean as possible to reach our goals. If we want to reach the top at any craft, you have to surround yourself with great people, and you yourself have to be great, and so them being great and you being great is kind of the cyclical thing that you all help each other And maybe the people around you aren't supposed to be around you forever, but realize when they are not supposed to be around you and cut them out, you're doing them a service as well, because maybe they need to move on to something as well, or something else rather. So hopefully that really helps you hone in on what the key takeaways from this podcast are.

Austin Seltzer: 1:29:01

This one was incredible. Thanks for listening to the Grounds for Success podcast. I wanna thank all of the people who work on this podcast and help me out. My team is everything to me, and without them I couldn't bring these to you every single week. I wanna also thank all of my clients on the Mixing and Mastering side, because without you I could not have Grounds for Success. So thank you so much. If you're enjoying the Grounds for Success podcast, please follow, like and subscribe on whichever platform you're listening or watching on. It helps us out a ton, and I wanna keep getting this content to you in whichever way you listen or watch.