Not many people think of experimental, ambient, and drone when considering what genre of music to make; however, for local musician Mythmaking, these genres have always spoken to him.
Mythmaking, a.k.a. Isaac Szeto, says his love for music can all be traced back to his dad. From his extensive record collection to giving Szeto a classical guitar in the Grade 6, Szeto’s dad planted his musical seeds early on.
“I was starting from just the history of rock. That was the music I was interested in at the time, and I taught myself how to play, so I was forming bands with kids in junior high and high school and things,” Szeto says. “And then I just kept exploring.”
In 2020, Szeto released his first album under the Mythmaking name, titled The Pit. He says when he starts making a piece of music, he does not know how it will turn out.
“I have an emotion that I might be trying to chase,” he says. “Usually I think a song is finished, to me, when I feel the emotional thing that I need to feel when I play it.”
This is reflected in the track length of some of the songs on The Pit. The longest song on the album, Wells Will Follow You Everywhere You Go, is just under 18 minutes long.
Szeto’s creative process is also very personal.
“I’m always trying to move or interest me. It’s not that I don’t consider other people, I love when my music resonates with other people,” he says. “It’s the most lovely thing in the world when people come up to me after a show and tell me that they were touched, or I can see that they were visibly so, but I don’t make it for them. I make it for me.”
An expert on the more technical side of the music making process is James Stanley, who is the owner, producer and engineer at Ghost Iron Studio. Although his genres of choice are more punk and metal-centric, Stanley hears all types of music at his studio.
“I love to see what bands bring in, the new technologies, different techniques, different genres,” he says. “It’s just awesome, especially the culture. You meet people from all over the world and it’s super cool to see how they look at music.”
Both Stanley and Szeto recommend having all of your material done before you go into the studio. That way, according to Stanley, you can make sure everything is polished and ready for release.
Republish our articles for free under a Creative Commons license.
Republish this article
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
We would love for you to republish our student work!
Just scroll down to copy and paste the code of our article into your CMS. The codes for images, graphics and other embeddable elements may not transfer exactly as they appear on our site. It's free! We only ask that you follow some simple guidelines when doing so:-
You've gotta credit us. In the byline, we prefer “Author Name, Calgary Journal.” At the top of the story, include a line that reads: “This story was originally published by the Calgary Journal.”
-
If you’re republishing online, you must link to the URL of the original story on calgaryjournal.ca.
-
You can’t edit our material, except to reflect relative changes in time, location and editorial style. (For example, “yesterday” can be changed to “last week,” and “Abbotsford, B.C.” to “Abbotsford” or “here.”)
-
You cannot republish our photographs or illustrations without specific permission. Please contact managing damclean@mtroyal.ca for more information.
-
Any website our stories appear on must include a prominent way to contact you.
-
If you share the story on social media, we’d appreciate a shout-out @CalgaryJournal (Facebook, Twitter and Instagram)
- If we send a request to change or remove Calgary Journal content on your site, you must agree to do so immediately.
This policy was adapted from ProPublica and Wisconsin Watch.
If you have any other questions, contact our managing editor Archie McLean at damclean@mtroyal.ca