10 Questions with Myslie

In this week’s 10 Questions we get to know Myslie, an indie music artist from California, USA.

Their song ‘Double Stepper (feat. Keira Jaylynne)’ is currently featured on the NAS Spotify playlists

You can follow Myslie on Instagram and Tik Tok

1. Tell us a little about where you are from.

Hi I go by Myslie online, and I’m from California. Currently I am finishing up the soundtrack for my video game.

2. What inspired Myslie to start playing and making music?

I used to have a composer for the video game I was making. Things weren’t working out, so we stopped working together. After we parted ways, I asked my DJ partner, who happens to voice one of the characters in the game, what I should do. She told me to make the music myself. I figured I would give it a shot, and I took the idea and ran with it.

After we parted ways, I asked my DJ partner, who happens to voice one of the characters in the game, what I should do.

3. Who are Myslie’s biggest musical influences?

The way I sing comes from my obsession with Billie Joe Armstrong from Green Day. I really liked punk rock when I was a kid. I also find many games to be a big inspiration, like Rhythm Heaven and Pokémon Platinum. A little Jet Set Radio and Yakuza as well, specifically the karaoke tracks.

I would describe my genre as indie-adjacent OST. I really can’t pin a specific style or genre to my music unless I just say pop, because there are a lot of different influences mixing together to form my sound.

4. What are your goals in the music industry or as an artist?

Music was like a proof of concept for my creative endeavors. Music is a big part of what I think makes media work. If a scene has great music, the audience or player can really feel the emotions the characters are going through. I happened to start making music and releasing it first because Toby Fox started in a similar way.

5. Tell us about your creative process.

I usually start with chords, and I just loop them until I can find a melody in them. That’s usually what comes first. After that, everything else clicks into place. I loop phrases over and over again in an effort to find a song underneath the beat I create. It’s usually after the vocals that I start adding embellishments and such.

6. What is your all-time favorite song by another artist and why?

This answer always fluctuates. If I were to say right now what my favorite song would be, it might be Goodbye to a World by Porter Robinson. Everything about that track is rich with a feeling of lament and sorrow. I think he knew exactly what he wanted to convey, and he did it so well.

Everything about that track is rich with a feeling of lament and sorrow.

7. What is the best advice you have either given or received in terms of music?

I remember when I first started, I was up in Tahoe with my friend. We were going to meet some of the friends he met while he was in SoCal. I talked to one guy who was studying music, and he told me I should start with one thing first. Just something small to start with, and then start building on that phrase if it inspired me. One of the best pieces of advice I’ve ever gotten.

8. What is your proudest accomplishment?

Right after I released Double Stepper, my friend asked me to perform at her sister’s wedding. I had just started making music, and my friend heard the song I released and asked if I wanted to perform for them. It was such a high honor, especially since I wasn’t really that known creatively. They just knew the name and the face and asked if I could perform for them.

That was a really sweet moment, and it showed me that performing and making music can make an impact on people. Hearing about how my performance went from others was such an eye-opening experience. I realized I moved people with my music, and that’s not something I thought I would be able to say, especially after just one release. I still have the bottle of Pinaq they gave me on my desk.

That was a really sweet moment, and it showed me that performing and making music can make an impact on people.

9. What’s been your most embarrassing moment so far?

I cringe every time I think I see someone calling out to me and then find out they were trying to say hi to someone else. I haven’t been in too many embarrassing situations, at least not enough to really dictate “the most embarrassing moment,” but the calling-out thing happens to me enough times that I consider it the worst.

10. Tell us about your lowest and highest points in music so far.

The lowest I’ve ever been with my music was when I was chasing genre. I came into the soundtrack world trying to make plugnb. I even bought presets to make that type of music. The hard part was that it’s tough for me to make music within a genre, as my other influences always seem to make their way into the tracks and turn them into something completely different. Eventually, I stopped trying so hard and just went with it.

Which, in turn, happened to be my highest point: accepting my own music. Just letting the sound be what it wants to be really changed my perception of music creation. I couldn’t beat it, so I joined it. I brought it all together to create something I can truly call my own.