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around the globe
crwn
The musical polymath touches on transforming his bedroom project into a full-time job.
King Puentespina’s experimental bedroom project crwn came to be from a simple goal: to try something new. Having already been the drummer of rock band She’s Only Sixteen for more than a decade, the Filipino beatmaker was no stranger to the local music scene. That said, he didn’t expect a group of hungry listeners to flock to the SoundCloud he created for crwn. Hitting 100 plays on the sampled lofi jazz beats he first created on the Ableton music software already sent him over the moon, but to his own surprise, that number increased tenfold in a span of a month, causing him to adopt the crwn moniker.
“I didn’t know if people would vibe or listen to my beats then. Looking back, I’m really thankful they all tuned in because I wouldn’t be where I am now if it weren’t for those early listeners. They gave me the drive to just churn out songs that were super raw and unrefined and accepted them as real songs,” he recalls.
The defining labels of music didn’t really mean much to crwn. Thanks to the internet, the producer was no longer bound to the norms of genres and could instead dissect aspects of different sonic structures to create a completely new one. “That’s the beauty of producing music these days,” he says. “You can have a funk/psychedelic/country/Afrobeat album (that sounds really fun to make) and have a specific audience that would eat that up just because there’s so much music right now that puts genres in a blender.”
As his solo project began to take up more of his time, crwn recognized that having two musical outputs could be an advantage rather than a hindrance — despite the occasional scheduling conflicts. “It started being a main thing around 2014 when Jess [Connelly] and I released Under Blankets. We were getting booked with drafts of our EP being performed, so it definitely became more real when that was happening. People really zoned in on that project that time and I was overwhelmed by the support. Like, okay, I guess I’m doing this full-time now,” he remembers.
The skills and techniques he’s learned from his solo career plus the unfailing encouragement from his bandmates-turned-brothers have given him an additional role in She’s Only Sixteen — he’s now sitting behind the soundboard on top of his duties inside the booth. As the co-producer of their upcoming project, he’s all about pushing for new things. He explains, “I think having instincts and a mentality of a producer aids the songwriting/recording process tenfold because now we know how to tackle problems more efficiently. We can call shots that we wouldn’t have been able to if I didn’t know how to produce music.”
essentials
Name: crwn
Location: Manila, Philippines
Projects: Orchid, Labyrinth, How I Love
BACKGROUND
“My job as an artist and a producer comes down to two things, and that’s making sure that the song sounds amazing and that it connects and relates with the listener in some way. If I don’t make that happen then I’ve failed the song completely.”
music
As you grow more comfortable as crwn, where do you find yourself getting inspiration these days?
I listen to a lot of music everyday (old and new) just to keep myself on my toes, especially when I hear something I’ve never heard before. The times that I go, “Why haven’t I tried that?” drives me crazy and gets me to work on a song right away. Right now, I’m fascinated with film scoring, sound design and soundtrack. I’ve been watching a lot of films lately and I love it when the soundtrack or the score really supports the story or the scene. Recently, the Uncut Gems soundtrack drove me nuts. Howard Ratner’s theme music was beautiful, disturbing and worked so well throughout the movie.
Traveling, reading and visiting museums also gets me super inspired as well as being in close proximity with fellow artists. I try to absorb as much art and experience as I possibly can and squeeze it out when I’m making music.
It also helps you visualize what you want to happen on your particular project. I make sure that my projects are seamlessly intertwined with my experiences and influences, just so it becomes more authentic to myself.
The term “experimental” is difficult to gauge because not everyone has the same ears. Based on your experience and credibility, what makes an experimental track work?
For me, making something experimental is diving in unexplored territory. It should make you uncomfortable, but when you listen to it, it somehow makes complete sense. So then you get into the groove of making it, and it becomes a whole thing. It is hard to gauge so you just have to be in a mood for disrupting the norm. Disrupting is good when it’s coming from a good place and when you just want to innovate.
Sampling is a skill that not everyone can learn, let alone master. As a beatmaker, what attracts you to a sample?
It should feel good on your first listen. Then it feels good on your second, so on. You loop that particular part, then it becomes your jump off point for that session. I think when you listen to enough music, you can distinguish what parts can work as a sample and what doesn’t. It takes a lot of practice to know what you can use but then again, it’s a lot of experimenting. Knowing that I’m standing on that artist’s shoulders is a huge pressure too because I have that standard to keep.
FUTURE
You’re set to release a solo album in mid-2020 to follow up 2018’s Orchid. Comparing your creative process for the two albums, were there any major differences that led to a change in your sound?
I don’t want to say too much and spoil it, but it’s hopefully going to make people dance and connect with one another. Orchid, which was just a beat-tape, was more introspective and was something you listen to on your own.
What themes can we expect to dive into in your upcoming album?
I’d have to say (without spoiling anything) that it explores a lot with our time here on Earth and that we have to make use of this lifetime to love one another and not waste a second of it with negativity. There’s just so much of it happening that’s out of our control, with our planet burning (literally and figuratively) and causing so much distress because of our own human
selfishness.
I wanted to make it an album that would bring people together and dance.
Dancing is one of the only things humans ever got right. Plus, it bands all of us together, so I double-downed on that idea and made this debut album about that.
What kind of emotions do you hope your next album will evoke from its listeners?
I’m gonna say it’s a mix of love, dancing and everything in between.
You’ve opened for the likes of RAC and played for the Philippines’ major festivals. Orchid even found its way on COLORS last July. As you continue to reach new heights, where do you see 2020 taking you?
Hopefully around the world.
manila, philippines
For HYPEBEAST's new series Around The Globe, we'll be speaking to musicians outside the english-speaking world, shining a light on up-and-coming artists to established acts outside of the United States.
For HYPEBEAST's new series Around The Globe, we'll be speaking to musicians outside the english-speaking world, shining a light on up-and-coming artists to established acts outside of the United States.
BACKGROUND
Early on, crwn already saw his roles as a producer and a band member in the same light. The disparity between his two sonic backgrounds is obvious, but the idea that those worlds might complement each other catches him off guard. “crwn has been gravitating towards acoustic instruments and more live sounds over the past few projects and the band has been experimenting with textures that are on the electronic side of the spectrum. So it’s interesting that you asked that. Wow, I just realized that now,” he notices.
He continues, “It goes hand in hand. My goal as a drummer is to make sure I do my best for the song to shine. I would rather stick to a tight rhythm section since I don’t really care about doing anything flashy unless the song or a certain part requires it.”
“It goes the same when I produce, I have to make sure that the song in totality becomes the best version you can be satisfied with. It’s a big help that I have a mentality of a drummer too since crwn songs tend to lean on having very atmospheric parts and they need a strong rhythmic backbone for that to get pulled off smoothly.”
Leaping from one end of the musical spectrum to the other can be overwhelming for some artists, but crwn allowed his affinity for music to guide him rather than restrict him to what he was already comfortable with. “I pushed [boundaries] because the artists that I’ve been listening and watching have proven that you can basically do whatever you want with your art,” he says. “It’s cheesy, but the only person stopping that project from ever being realized is you.”
After two collaborative projects with Jess Connelly and August Wahh and two solo releases (with a new one on the way), crwn now averages 108,000 monthly listeners on Spotify with streams topping over 5 million. The musical polymath’s project broke out of the confines of his bedroom to bring him on stage as RAC’s opener and at Thailand’s Wonderfruit Music Festival in 2019.
In the midst of his preparations for his forthcoming album, HYPEBEAST sat down with crwn to talk about the unpredictable art of experimental music, the nature of his collaborations and his exploration of our limited time here on Earth.
music
Jumping into specifics, your past collaborations include Jess Connelly’s first EP How I Love and Labyrinth with August Wahh. What do you look for in other artists when cooking up a partnership?
Their songwriting should be coming from a genuine place. At least for me, it’s easy to tell if an artist isn’t being sincere about pursuing music. They have to love music down to their core. I’ve been hit up several times by people to make a song or tracks together knowing full well that they’re not in it for the long haul and it would’ve been just for internet clout. Passion for music is the first thing I look for when collaborating with anything.
You previously mentioned that as a collaborator, you “transcribe” what the other artist wants to say through their songwriting. What are lyrical aspects aid you in crafting its sonic counterpart?
My job as an artist and a producer comes down to two things, and that’s making sure that the song sounds amazing and that it connects and relates with the listener in some way. If I don’t make that happen then I’ve failed the song completely. So with collaborating or even just making instrumentals, bringing those two things out are my priority.
It’s a team effort when you collaborate and it’s one of my favorite things to do in making music. You call the shots and he or she calls the shots, it’s just a back and forth of trying to get your ideas coincide and mesh to make the best possible track you can make with them.
When translating lyrics into beats, what characteristics are those two supposed to share in order to release the same kind of message?
It helps when the songwriting has strong visual elements to it, I try my best to compliment a certain word or verse, or a hook with a sound or an instrument. Vice-versa. Both of you are trying to tell a story and you have to strive to get that story across. Again, it’s a team effort.
King Puentespina’s experimental bedroom project crwn came to be from a simple goal: to try something new. Having already been the drummer of rock band She’s Only Sixteen for more than a decade, the Filipino beatmaker was no stranger to the local music scene. That said, he didn’t expect a group of hungry listeners to flock to the SoundCloud he created for crwn. Hitting 100 plays on the sampled lofi jazz beats he first created on the Ableton music software already sent him over the moon, but to his own surprise, that number increased tenfold in a span of a month, causing him to adopt the crwn moniker.
“I didn’t know if people would vibe or listen to my beats then. Looking back, I’m really thankful they all tuned in because I wouldn’t be where I am now if it weren’t for those early listeners. They gave me the drive to just churn out songs that were super raw and unrefined and accepted them as real songs,” he recalls.
The defining labels of music didn’t really mean much to crwn. Thanks to the internet, the producer was no longer bound to the norms of genres and could instead dissect aspects of different sonic structures to create a completely new one. “That’s the beauty of producing music these days,” he says. “You can have a funk/psychedelic/country/Afrobeat album (that sounds really fun to make) and have a specific audience that would eat that up just because there’s so much music right now that puts genres in a blender.”
As his solo project began to take up more of his time, crwn recognized that having two musical outputs could be an advantage rather than a hindrance — despite the occasional scheduling conflicts. “It started being a main thing around 2014 when Jess [Connelly] and I released Under Blankets. We were getting booked with drafts of our EP being performed, so it definitely became more real when that was happening. People really zoned in on that project that time and I was overwhelmed by the support. Like, okay, I guess I’m doing this full-time now,” he remembers.
The skills and techniques he’s learned from his solo career plus the unfailing encouragement from his bandmates-turned-brothers have given him an additional role in She’s Only Sixteen — he’s now sitting behind the soundboard on top of his duties inside the booth. As the co-producer of their upcoming project, he’s all about pushing for new things. He explains, “I think having instincts and a mentality of a producer aids the songwriting/recording process tenfold because now we know how to tackle problems more efficiently. We can call shots that we wouldn’t have been able to if I didn’t know how to produce music.”
Jumping into specifics, your past collaborations include Jess Connelly’s first EP How I Love and Labyrinth with August Wahh. What do you look for in other artists when cooking up a partnership?
Their songwriting should be coming from a genuine place. At least for me, it’s easy to tell if an artist isn’t being sincere about pursuing music. They have to love music down to their core. I’ve been hit up several times by people to make a song or tracks together knowing full well that they’re not in it for the long haul and it would’ve been just for internet clout. Passion for music is the first thing I look for when collaborating with anything.
You previously mentioned that as a collaborator, you “transcribe” what the other artist wants to say through their songwriting. What are lyrical aspects aid you in crafting its sonic counterpart?
My job as an artist and a producer comes down to two things, and that’s making sure that the song sounds amazing and that it connects and relates with the listener in some way. If I don’t make that happen then I’ve failed the song completely. So with collaborating or even just making instrumentals, bringing those two things out are my priority.
It’s a team effort when you collaborate and it’s one of my favorite things to do in making music. You call the shots and he or she calls the shots, it’s just a back and forth of trying to get your ideas coincide and mesh to make the best possible track you can make with them.
When translating lyrics into beats, what characteristics are those two supposed to share in order to release the same kind of message?
It helps when the songwriting has strong visual elements to it, I try my best to compliment a certain word or verse, or a hook with a sound or an instrument. Vice-versa. Both of you are trying to tell a story and you have to strive to get that story across. Again, it’s a team effort.