Adrian Younge (born 1978) is an American composer, arranger and music producer based in the Los Angeles area. He is also an entertainment law professor and edits and scores films.
I think that being a film composer, someone that gets it and actually applies the music, it allows you to open up a spectrum of feeling. You're now allowed to approach the music from an audio visual perspective.
Hip-hop has permeated pop culture for decades. For a long time, though, it seemed to permeate it in a such a way that it never really got its just due. Now, hip-hop seems to be getting that recognition and is more widely accepted, which is great.
I don't have any computers in my studio, it's all analog tape. All analog tape, all old equipment, I mean my mics are like from the 60's and early 70's, everything in there is old.
When you're composing for somebody, that means you have a boss. You have to do what it takes to, at the end of the day, appease them.
What really, really inspires me is that you don't see many black superheroes on television.
The easy answer is to say that it's a part for black people to see black heroes, but to me it's important to young Mexican kids to see a black hero.
Blaxploitation films were black films targeting black people. They were films made to appeal to a culture in a way that was supposed to be unfiltered.
It's important to the world to see superheroes that are spread across our demographic.
When you get above the line, you're above the line. So my thing is I just want to make music where I am always above that line.
It's important for a young black kid to see a Mexican hero, just to know that we're all equal.
I try to make classics. I don't try to make things that aren't good. It's always a pleasure to see that people care about the kind of music I'm making.
To me, when something is classic, whether it came out today or thirty years ago, it falls all in the same pot.
When people score films, the job is to be visual. When people make music, it's about evoking feeling. It's great when you get both feelings and being out of their head.