Music Producer
Rolling Sound

Eric L – Rolling Sound

00:00:02 My name’s Eric L and I’m a Music Producer and I’m head of music at Rolling Sound. A normal day for me would be either making music on a particular project for a label or remix work. That’s one side of it. The other side of it, I’d be doing some either tutoring, consultancy work for Rolling Sound, teaching young people or consulting on projects to deliver projects to young people.

00:00:31 I’m assigned to a label in America and they’ve given me a deal so they’ve given me X amount of money and I make an album for them. I get other work like remix work or production work and they pay me for the time and to use my music and I get paid more money from royalties from when it’s played out on radio.

00:00:57 I completely did not imagine that I’d be doing what I do at school, not one bit. You know, I did very safe subjects, you know, whether it was to please myself or my parents, I’m not sure. You know, I did like a business, maths, computing A levels. Personally I wanted to do art but it wasn’t an option for me. I wasn’t allowed to. Just it was not approved but, you know, I thank my parents for the guidance they’ve given me.

00:01:29 Then I went to university and did a business marketing degree so I have no formal training in music whatsoever.

00:01:39 The change came in my inset really when I was at college, you know, before I did my exams, my best friend, he committed suicide and it completely changed my outlook on life, you know. I went to Uni with an open mind. Still, you know, open to do the business degree, that’s fine, but I tried loads of different things. Came across music and then realised that it was my passion and I, you know, believed in it and believed I was good at it.

00:02:11 After Uni, you can’t just rely on your parents’ help. Like you have to support yourself. So I actually worked in a trainer store, a fancy trainer store in Carnaby Street selling trainers full time because I wanted to do music. You know, it paid off. You know, it gave me time. I got a management deal from having time to do what I wanted to do and then that led onto more things.

00:02:36 I started doing an internship at this record label called BBE and they asked me to go around all their record stores to check on their stock around London. So during that trip, I was playing the people in the record stores my demos just to see what they thought and the feedback was, you know, really good, especially from one record store called Deal Real. They kind of were saying well, you know, we can may be help you out, and that turned into a management deal and, you know, I got a lot of opportunities and a lot of experience from that. So that’s how it happened.

00:03:13 At first, my parents did not approve. You know, like just coming from a Chinese background to be doing music was, you know, obviously frowned upon at first but the turning point was I got nominated for this Pearl Award and my dad went to the award ceremony with me and like he couldn’t believe that just the music that I was making was getting some sort of… just respect.

00:03:45 And like that completely changed his mind about it and he saw that I was supporting myself just from it. So, you know, I have their full support now and they now that I’m happy.

00:03:57 I have absolutely no regrets in my life. Taking this route has led me to meet so many wonderful people, do what I love on a day to day and to inspire many so if I can do that through a career and, you know, live off it, that’s a blessing. ENDS