From busking the streets of Melbourne with a rusty old saxophone, to fronting bands at Splendour In The Grass and Falls Festival, Spender (aka Tommy Spender) is one fascinating guy. While at night he traverses the country to playing live, recording and producing his own music, and working with Gotye, by day he runs his music company Donut Beach, writing and recording soundtracks for TV and radio commercials, producing bands, and teaching primary school kids garage band.
Currently on his first ever headline tour in support of his new single ‘Lake’, we chatted with Spender about getting played at The Superbowl, the perks and pitfalls of making a living off writing music and how aspiring musicians can do the same. Be sure to catch Spender when he plays at Shebeen this Friday the 29th.
As well as being a talented performer, you’ve also founded Donut Beach Music, can you explain a little about Donut Beach?
“Cheers. Well, about 10 years ago some music I wrote somehow found its way to the Super Bowl which is the most expensive advertising spot on the planet. We paid back our label and publishers and all went on holidays and paid for a new record. It was then I realised that it wasn’t much of a stretch writing for someone instead of myself. I just started building a portfolio of stuff I was getting commissioned to do. From there its built into an income I support my family with.”
How did Donut Beach music come about? Do you have a bit of an origin story?
“The name came from my young son. I had decided to take it all a bit more seriously as more and more commissions where coming in and I was really just responding with no real plan to my time management (which is appalling) I went and put myself in a NEIS (New Enterprise Incentive Scheme) scheme which should be the first step in any artists career wether starting out or re-skilling.
I had a business plan and had to come up for a name. We were driving along the st kilda foreshore and he was in the back eating donuts. I said “leroy! what should I call my business? Without batting an eye lid he said ‘Donut Beach'”
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Can you tell us about some of your favourite projects you’ve written music for?
“Its the most frustrating and sometimes financially devastating, but I enjoy scoring and sound designing live theatre as its powerful when it all comes together. Best of all the worlds really.”
Do you think that writing music for other people’s projects (advertisements/ theatre/ tv programs etc) is a sustainable career people who just want to make music for a living?
“Yes, in fact its probably one of the ways you can make your career sustainable as there is always a project around the corner that leads to another etc. You must have a few irons in the fire to make it work for the long haul.
I started Donut Beach Music as over the years I’ve constantly had to change hats to pay the bills. Recording other bands, making music for theatre shows or short films, doing peoples websites etc etc Each one of these disciplines has a myriad of things you need to be competent at to charge people. I wanted to separate it all out and not confuse my own work with others I was working on.”
Is there anything about the gig you particularly love or hate or find challenging (or all three)?
“Its like any gig, there are moments where you want the earth’s crust to open up and take you down into it, and there are moments where you leap out of bed dying to get back into the studio. I do now, daily , pinch myself and remind myself that when I started music my only dream was to one day support myself and possibly a family being creative. Nothing more really. Its odd to have now arrived and wonder what’s next?”
Do you try and keep your ‘work’ and ‘creative/ personal’ music separate?
“Yes, but I’m struggling at the moment to make time for my own material. I have enough material for a new album but am in a backlog of others work I’m finishing, including production on mixing on 2 other artists releases.”
Is the way you approach writing music for clients different to the way you approach writing music as a purely artist/ personal endeavour? In what ways is it different?
“Yes, I have a rule. With advertising briefs , I respond to it as thoughtlessly and instinctively as possible with no emotion other than the pure enjoyment of putting it all together quickly. This only happens with practice as I used to spend days on music only to be crushed when they said ‘nah, its too sad, but we want it to still feel deep'”
Has writing music for others helped you develop any new skills or musical connections?
“I guess I’ve gotten better at musically getting out of my own way, and believing more in my instincts and doing it all quicker than I used to.”
Do you have any advice for music hoping to make music professionally like you do?
“Just don’t fucking take no for an answer. Don’t go to schools to learn music industry ‘skills’. The industry is made up of people making it up as they go.
If you want to get better at techniques and software, watch Youtube or listen to friends working. Do it for free at the start and as often as you can and don’t feel bad about it. Sometimes when you’re not getting paid you’re actually getting a lot more out of it.”
Spender will be launching ‘Lake’ at Shebeen on August 29th alongside Tully On Tully and Hue Blanes.
