BY STEPHANIE ESLAKE
Trigger warning: This story contains mention of suicide. If you need mental health support, please contact your GP or call Lifeline on 13 11 14.
13 Reasons Why is not an easy show to watch.
The Netflix series unravels the inner-most thoughts of a young American girl who commits suicide after experiences of bullying and rape culture in her school environment.
Then, it takes you into the lives of the friends who weren’t there to support her — and their own prolonged and personal struggles, too.
Not only does musician Brendan Angelides (Eskmo) need to sit down and watch every scene of the emotionally challenging series. But he has to watch these scenes again, and again, and again — until he crafts the perfect soundtrack for you to listen to when you tune in, too.
We chat with this Los Angeles music producer and composer about his score for 13 Reasons Why.
(Eskmo, who is a founding member of non-profit collective The Echo Society, also worked on the show Billions, and gives us a taste of the differences between these TV projects as well.)
Brendan, tell us about your journey into scoring 13 Reasons Why. You’d founded The Echo Society and it led to you working on this hugely popular TV series. Talk us through the importance of making your own opportunities as a composer and in the screen music industry.
I’ve been a touring/recording/producer-type artist since the early 2000s. I released an album in 2015 called Sol that Brian Koppelman, one of the showrunners for Billions, heard on NPR. He and his writing partner David Levien got in touch to see if I was interested in scoring his upcoming show. I jumped at the opportunity, and was incredibly grateful they gave me the opportunity.
So to be honest, I sort of fell into it. I had to learn very quickly about how it all works. Working on this show led me to being one of the people considered for 13 Reasons Why.
My meeting with the showrunner Brian Yorkey also went in a similar way. We always discussed inspirations and being adventurous with the music. For both shows, it felt important for me to keep my background as an artist intact and [was also] part of the discussions as each project moved forward. I’ve been very lucky to work with the teams that I have.
I have watched both series so far and (like many other viewers find, I suspect) it is not easy viewing. As a composer, how do you detach yourself personally from such a distressing story — when you simultaneously need to immerse yourself in this world, and continuously revisit so many powerful scenes?
I think being used to writing and performing songs with albums and touring, I’ve gotten used to that process already. You live in an emotion, get super attached and live it, and then move on. Perhaps it’s a muscle I’ve already been used to, in a way.
Also [important are] the basics where I make sure to keep healthy on my end: eating, exercising, personal time — and that usually balances out any need to detach.
Through the series, we can empathise with many characters. But we can also see, almost painfully, how much trauma they are inflicting on each other — often too young to understand consequences. How do you ‘compose’ this sort of ambiguity of human nature?
I always tend to go towards the character as opposed to the scene, unless it asks for it. Meaning, I’ll try to write music that reflects the inner state of the kid or parent involved, and allow the scene to carry the emotions.
The music always wants to feel supportive, and it’s important not to overtly tell your audience what they should feel. It’s a constant balance. Everyone in the show is figuring it all out, and it’s a nice challenge riding that wave of discovery alongside the characters, whether that’s physical discoveries or emotional.
The characters have changed, along with the narrative, across each season (almost across each episode!). How has your soundtrack changed from seasons 1-3? Is it your responsibility to drive their development, too?
It’s evolved along the way. It’s a very theme-centric show, which is super fun for me. So a lot of the process and challenge is how to take existing themes, textures, and motifs and have them shift into new spaces.
It’s still a balance of dark and light. No matter how dark and intense each season gets, it’s ultimately about love, family, and finding truth.
I think it is part of my responsibility to have the themes grow alongside the characters.
The soundtrack includes some contemporary songs, and in season 3 you work on a cover of Duran Duran’s Ordinary World. The band of course was hugely popular in the 1980s — an era which seems to be having something of a cultural revival. Did ’80s and ’90s cultural nostalgia influence your decision to choose a Duran Duran song?
Actually, Brian Yorkey and music supervisor Season Kent came up with the idea of using the song. In the first season, I collaborated on a cover of Only You with Selena Gomez. The original is uptempo and energetic, so I decided to go the slow ballad type route.
For Ordinary World, since the original is slower and dreamy, I thought it would be exciting to have it be faster and more head-nod like. In my mind, I wondered how Peter Gabriel might approach it and went in that direction, combined with some of my own sound.
Working with Morgan Kibby (M83, White Sea) was an obvious choice and she did amazingly.
The show sends some powerful key messages, the most obvious of which are anti-bullying, suicide awareness, the value of friendship, and — in seasons 2 and 3 — anti-gun violence. What do you feel to be the most important message of this show? And how does your perspective inform your work?
I think it’s all of the above, but I would say the underlying one is shining a light on rape culture. Out of this toxicity comes the suicide, the gun violence, the bullying.
I know one of the goals of the show has been to get kids to speak with each other, parents, and teachers. This has certainly happened. Everyone is experiencing something in their lives, even when we don’t know about it. There is a sense of you are not alone, even when it may feel that way. In terms of my work, it keeps me constantly going back to writing from the heart. Sometimes that’s lovely and warm, and other times it’s really quite dark.
Outside 13 Reasons Why, you have also worked as a composer on Billions. How would you compare these two experiences? Are there similarities in your creative process, or have you found it an entirely different ride with a different team?
It’s an entirely different show, team, and process. The Billions team is based in New York City, so I see them in-person once a year, while 13 Reasons Why is in Los Angeles, so we have spotting sessions each week.
Billions is intentionally steered away from overt themes, and it’s usually a very electronic type score — rarely has strings, piano, or anything in that world.
13 Reasons Why is a very theme-based show and the palette is a hybrid mixture of electronic and orchestral.
My brain shifts into different modes while working on each show and I love it.
Before you go, favourite soundtrack of all time?
The main Zelda theme.
Watch the trailer for 13 Reasons Why.
Images supplied. Credit: Trevor Traynor.
