How did you get into music?

I've been writing music all my life, but didn't decide to pursue it as a career until college. Originally I started as a Music Education major then switched to Music Composition. I felt as long as I was in school I was safe, so I decided to get another degree in Film and Television Music from The University of Southern California when I graduated. Through that program I met a working composer and became his assistant. I would usually take on the TV projects (trailers and commercials) while he was working on films. The turnaround was very quick… you could have deadlines on Thursday, mix on Friday, and then hear it air on TV over the weekend.

A lot of the projects I was composing for back then were work-for-hire. You would score the whole job and then see if you would actually get hired and paid. We would end up submitting a few different versions for what was being commissioned: submit three or so takes on what they wanted, and then inevitably they would like different sections of each. I would compile them together to make the piece they were looking for.

That's how I got into composing for television. The TV and film work is very different than scoring for video games. They are very linear and planned out, but music for video games is all about the interactivity and non-linear quality.

How about video games? Before you were scoring for games, were you an avid player?

Most definitely! I enjoyed playing, but not as much as some other gamers. There was a general lack of ability on my behalf, which I made up for with enthusiasm. And playing games now, I've actually become even worse! I'm used to being “invincible” so my skills have not improved.

Invincible?

Once the developer and I have gotten to a point where we want to sit down and play through the game together and listen to the music, we turn on “God Mode.” You have unlimited lives, no one can kill you, etc. It allows us to just walk through the game and hear the music. I can then go through the entire game in about two hours as opposed to twelve, but it makes playing actual games all the more challenging for me!

Let's talk about the scoring process. Where does the inspiration start for you when scoring a game? Is it the way the characters move, the way the landscape looks...

In the past few years I have been able to visit the developer and spend at least a day with them and completely immerse myself in the game. For me, it starts with the concept art, the environment, and the characters. When I am brought on, the game might not even be at a playable stage yet. To go out and see the developer and spend a day or two with them is amazing. It's awesome to see those guys on the front end and get a feeling and direction to run with. They explain their inspirations for the game and then I funnel it into the sound.

I get my musical drive and inspiration from great classical composers such as Stravinsky or Tchaikovsky. Listening to that kind of music pushes me to improve my skills every day; I've always felt if you're going to set the bar, you better set it high.

As you have scored more and more titles in the industry, have those meetings changed?

It used to be that I would get to those meetings and they would say, “Here is what we want the music to sound like…”, giving me references to movies and other games. I don't really get references anymore, they ask me to do what I think it should sound like and it's very rewarding; they look to me for how I think the project should sound. To ask for my opinion and input for their game is, to me, the greatest compliment I can receive. For example, for the Dead Space franchise, EA wanted “the scariest music ever written,” but that was the only guideline they gave me. I was given free creative rein to come up with the score. And I'm lucky that I haven't been typecast yet! I'm working on a bunch of other titles that aren't in the horror genre. When I chat with the developers, they want me to do the same kind of original musical treatment for them, just not with a horror vibe. I've always felt that any good composer can write in many styles, just how any decent chef can cook in many different cuisines; music and cooking have a lot in common.

Speaking of cooking, I recently read an article where you said "Soundtracks are like an appreciation of good wine." What does that mean to you?

Hey, that's a cool quote! Did I really say that? I suppose to me it means the more you know and choose to educate yourself on a specific subject, the more you can appreciate it. Having a really good meal in a French restaurant... maybe you don't know why it tastes so good, but it does and you enjoy it. You don't need all the technical know-how, you just know how you respond to it, and that's what I've always loved about music. When you're cooking you know how you want something to taste, like if it needs salt. Music is the same - it's like listening to something and knowing to add some high-end on the EQ.

There is a creative need that is fulfilled in me by both music and cooking. There's something about presenting an artistic endeavor to an audience and trying to entertain them that resonates with me on a base level. If I weren't a composer, I think I would somehow be involved in the culinary arts. But that's for another interview!

Back to Dead Space 2 for a minute, that was one of the most terrifying games I've ever played. How does one go about scoring a nightmare?

Very carefully! There was a lot of research on my part in the beginning, probably six months of studying scores and taking notes. While I was writing it, I was never sure if it was scary enough... I always felt like it had to be even scarier. There was definitely some desensitization going on!

All of those "BOO" moments are what makes that game so scary. How did you compose these moments so they would consistently scare the user over and over again?

There's a great randomization to the really fast scares. I composed more than 100 different "jolts" and the game would select different ones at different times to maximize the "BOO" factor.

That's a genius way to make sure the player is always on their toes in the soundscape. What role do you feel the soundscape plays in a game?

I think the audio is what draws people into the atmosphere of the game, at least if it's doing its job.

How are the iZotope products helping you to do that?

I use three products consistently in my work: Ozone, RX, and Stutter Edit.

Ozone works really well on pop and rock stuff. I work on commercials and trailers for video game companies or ad agencies. Those projects are the musical opposite of Dead Space - usually some sort of guitar/synth pop music, which can be refreshing! The clients usually want a product that sounds like it was recorded and mastered in NYC or LA at a professional, high-end studio, but this is just me playing guitars and drums by myself in my own studio. Ozone really helps me match that final mastered sound. It's the best-sounding high-end pop reference software I've used. I also love having everything built into one window. Not having to jump between all the different plug-in windows while mastering also saves me time, which is always a precious commodity in advertising.

RX was actually how I found out about iZotope in 2006, working on the original Dead Space music. With the first pieces I put together, I started to realize that there was a noise floor building up as I added more and more custom samples. With any sample library, the more sounds you use, the more the noise floor builds up - you have to do something about that. I bought or demoed every noise reduction product on the market and when I would render the files, everything sounded like it had reduction on it. There was always this swishy, underwater quality to it. But when I pulled up RX, I hit one preset and it sounded amazing. I actually sent out blind tests to some musician friends of mine – comparing options and asking them to pick out the one with noise reduction on it. They all couldn't believe that one of the samples had been processed through RX. I have to say, I'm not a sound engineer, but I totally understand how to get outstanding results from RX. Everything I record for samples gets run through RX. Dead Space 1 and 2 were both created from a custom sample library I created from my six different orchestral recording sessions. Every sound on those soundtracks was processed through RX, including the live string quartet pieces in Dead Space 2. RX was a game changer for me, no pun intended.

I'm actually using Stutter Edit on PREY 2, which is a lot of fun to work on. They wanted big build-ups to sections of the music with really dramatic changes between. I used Stutter Edit on the transitions and it turns out it was exactly what they were looking for. It's a program that is just so easy to use. Pull up preset, hit play, and just mess around on the keyboard until it sounds good. Everything that comes out is always so musical – and that's what iZotope products represent for me. The perfect combination of musical inspiration and technical achievement.

For more information on Jason Graves, please visit jasongraves.com.