TATE SEDAR, a generational talent who hails from Los Angeles, United States is out again with visuals for his release “Find A Way”. We had a few questions and answers with him. Below are exclusive details on TATE SEDAR and his new release.
Continue reading to learn more about this amazing artist.
What is your real name?
Tate Sedar
What’s your official Stage Name (showbiz name)?
TATE SEDAR
What do you do (fashion, music, comedy, artist, dancer, etc.)?
I’m a producer/DJ/songwriter.
How did you get into what you do (music, modelling, art, dance, etc.?)
Before my current career roles, I always wanted to sing. I was about 10 when my voice changed and I had to look at different musical outlets. I used to go to Apple Stores in the [San Francisco] Bay Area when I was 10 while my family shopped nearby. There, I discovered music production on GarageBand. Soon after, I discovered Daft Punk.
When I moved to London, I got my own MacBook at 11, loaded with GarageBand. I discovered Fatboy Slim & Justice in the UK and fully fell in love with electronic music. At 13, I learned to DJ at the Point Blank School of Music. I found my interest learning more towards electro house and started taking production seriously in 2010-11, during “the golden age of EDM.” I took classes in high school for production and focused my college degree & postgraduate years on advanced production & music business.
I also took a songwriting course at university led by Bob Halligan (written for Cher, KISS & Michael Bolton). I’ve been writing songs after his course for 6 years.
What field or genre are you into and give a brief description of what your career/profession/ field feels like?
I consider what I make a mix of electro house & dancepop. I meld different synths with analogue sounds like guitars, bells & keys – all under electro beats.
The barrier of entry into music production can be considered low now, but those that succeed put the hours in to advance their skills, stand out with their “sound” AND know how to market it. This mostly includes basic music theory & keyboard, composition, arrangement, sound design, recording, mixing, engineering and/or mastering. That can take years to get proficient in, depending on your own learning curve or personal/psychological obstacles. And unless you’re investing your savings or treating music like a job, people won’t look at it the same.
Who or what inspires you or motivates you? And why?
I’m inspired by messages in music. Electronic music, or more specifically house music, has never really had a unanimous message over the years. I look at artists from the 70s & 80s in rock, hip-hop & pop (one of my favourites being Michael Jackson) and use their thinking to challenge what message(s) I want my music to provide to others.
What was your first project and the people you worked with and which year?
A GarageBand project in the Apple Store, 2005, haha. I never got to take it home. I think after the third time I made a project in one of the stores, one good samaritan of an employee burned some projects on a CD. I’ll have to find that one day.
How many projects do you have so far?
I currently have 6 projects out on music distributors that are not Internet-based (i.e. Soundcloud, YouTube, etc). I have plenty more on the Internet-based ones and probably a hundred or so in total if you want to count all the ones that never got released (laughs).
How long have you been doing what you do?
I have been producing since I was 10, although my musical ambitions come from four.
What do you look out for in this line of business?
I look for people who value creativity over business but also see creativity as their livelihood and strive to make a living out of it. I would rather work with people that want to make a career out of music than not (i.e. just treat it as a hobby) because our goals usually align and they invest in their actions/decisions.
I also look out for (in this case, steer away from) people that take advantage of talents, generosity or finances. The music industry operates in “the grey” a lot, but you have to be thorough and keep a lookout for yourself. Some do not value skill, fair/ethical business as much as others. It’s easy to work with people who can overlook you, scam you, don’t deliver to expectations/as they promise or use you as a stepping stone into somewhere else. Use both your best foot & reasoning, get things in writing when you can and know your worth.
Have you won any awards or been nominated for an award? Or in short, any achievement? Both in and out of your career path.
I won a spot & performed on the EDC Virtual Rave-a-Thon lineup in 2020.
What is this new release about?
The new release focuses on my story (so far) and mental health in music. The track, in its structure, follows a similar journey to my own. It’s a rise, fall and get-back-up timeline that played out just like my past. I tried to juggle life with music, school and work, but then fell to the weight of it all and my own perfectionism and expectations. In 2020, I realised I had given up on trying to advance my skill set, kept working in old habits, and needed to break the cycle to move forward. This series of events is also shown in the music video I made with Chris Adams (shot for Insomniac Events & Golden Voice) and Eugene Luu (Armada Music and Pyro & Eclipse Records).
My past and this track touch on mental health. There are a lot of parts that go [specifically] into the producer career, in terms of education & processes. Everybody’s experience is different, but the process of mixing, engineering and mastering are dense in nature. I felt that my struggle with my own shortcomings became more evident at the time that big figures in dance music like Avicii & Pierce Fulton passed away. I started to take mental health seriously at 17, but it was only until after their deaths and in 2020 that I made serious changes in my life, ultimately bettering my psychological health. The whole project follows an active discourse on mental health care in the lives of creatives, especially for producers and those in the electronic music scene.
Who and how many people worked on it?
I created the whole track but can’t forget all the feedback I got from friends and colleagues, most notably from my unofficial musical aid, consultant & closest friend: Jeremy Joshua.
What can your previous and new audiences anticipate from you in the future?
Keep your ear out in the next 2 months for a remix. And further down the line, you can expect more original music of which I intend to get signed by labels!
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