We recently connected with Phil Lober and have shared our conversation below.

Phil, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Earning a full time living from one’s creative career can be incredibly difficult. Have you been able to do so and if so, can you share some of the key parts of your journey and any important advice or lessons that might help creatives who haven’t been able to yet?

I was 16 when I had my first paycheck for the documentary ‘Children of the Wind’. It was essentially a stipend but it sparked the chronology of paychecks to come. As I scored other features, small checks came in here and there. But it wasn’t until my good friend Jasper Blunk convinced me to pull the trigger on trailer music that I started to see benevolent returns.

Trailers only pay if you land it. So you could work for a long time and remain unpaid. The first year trying to write a suitable trailer track was difficult. My work sounded too filmic, and publishers thought it was beautiful but it did not have the correct ingredients to see it become accepted and placed into a trailer.

I kept trying and trying and eventually after an entire year, I cracked it. I began supplying major trailer music publishing agencies with loads of music every day.. The publisher’s critique and better judgement combined with my constant output, allowed us to work together to make each track the best it could be. My music later landed in a number of trailers and TV spots. And if it’s on TV, especially American TV, you can rack up royalties every quarter of the year.

Phil, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I am a film and trailer composer and songwriter born in Redondo Beach, California. I work on, you guessed it, films and trailers. And I also perform my own music on stage as a solo artist. I also am a sound designer and, if they really want me to be, an orchestrator.

I also am an educator and currently teach a number of students how to make trailer music via online classes and a course that is available on Youtube.

I started playing piano at the age of 6 and I would only stop if I really needed to. Otherwise I was fine being on there for 2-4 hours at a time.

In the world of trailers, clients have told me that they come to me if they have a difficult or complex brief. For instance, a track that sounds bouncy but not too bouncy. A song that sounds evil but heroic. A track that sounds mighty but agile.

I try to create a world within the music, that reaches out to other worlds. I want to transport the person to another place not on Earth but another dimension, where your deepest emotional fire is seen and you can see it as well. Where you feel you’re standing in the middle of a galaxy and it is the most true, real and honest thing you’ve ever felt.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

The most rewarding aspect is that, especially if you’re an artist from childhood, you are engrained into a paradigm of pure connection to things around you and people around you. Anything can have substance because anything can be art, and when anything can be art, anything can be a pathway to truth. Art is complete, unrefined honesty from the universe, untranslated until you decide to.

Most stereotypes about people are less frequent with artists. They are constantly challenging the status quo, in harmless yet effective ways. And there are always pockets of these people in every country. If you’re an artist you will connect with them extremely quickly; in a matter of seconds actually.

You are already complete as an artist. You don’t relate to a lot of the people around you claiming that life is a horrible thing. You don’t relate to the outside negativity as much. You stay indoors and work on your art. The physical adventures that your relationship with your art will bring you + the journey of thought and reflection that your mind takes you through while thinking about the world, people, your craft, is worth every second of being an artist. Because no matter where you will be, inside you’ll be free.

We’d love to hear your thoughts on NFTs. (Note: this is for education/entertainment purposes only, readers should not construe this as advice)

I’d be curious how people would feel if NFTs did not generate money. Would they still value the uniqueness of the art?

The technology itself can be admired, we’ve found a way to program non-permanence or at least non-scaleable quantities of code.

Contact Info:

• Website: musicofphil.com
• Instagram: @musicofphil
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/philloberofficial
• Linkedin: Phil Lober
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCoBkoYPPGcNUedmtfVHNOaQ

Image Credits
Yádin Verdoux