"When we were writing this we were very much writing about a character…and it wasn't until two days later that I was like, 'This is me.'" Billie Eilish and FINNEAS take us through a very intimate journey inside of their creative minds as they unveil how they created their soundtrack for the movie 'Barbie.' From the "physics" involved in the intricate production elements to Billie's "heartbroken" yet powerful delivery, the duo dissects every step behind bringing their hauntingly beautiful song to life.
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00 - It does like an emotional thing to you.
00:01 I feel the same way about the little,
00:03 what reminds me of like a Nintendo DS or something.
00:06 Which is this like arpeggiated organ.
00:09 - I love this, I think this does so much for the song.
00:11 - It plays so quietly, it just kind of peaks out
00:14 when the vocal goes away.
00:15 It sounds fake, it sounds like a toy.
00:17 - I think I want to barf, it's like so sentimental feeling.
00:20 - I really wanted the whole thing
00:21 to sound like Animal Crossing.
00:22 I think that was a big-- - Yeah, see?
00:23 ♪ What was I made for ♪
00:28 - Hi, I'm Billie Eilish.
00:30 - I'm Finneas.
00:30 - And we are going to be showing you how we made the song,
00:33 What Was I Made For.
00:34 It was one of the fastest songs we've ever written.
00:38 Once we got that first verse and that line,
00:41 just what was I made for, I think we were both like,
00:43 it was a good vibe.
00:45 And it was honestly like a half hour
00:47 that it took to do that.
00:48 ♪ What was I made for ♪
00:56 - This is like one of four cases total in our career
00:59 where we've made something and to then
01:00 kind of submit to people.
01:02 It's a different way of making music because--
01:04 - You're auditioning.
01:05 - Yeah, this is definitely an audition
01:06 and all we had was a voice memo.
01:08 Our main concern was we can't send them this voice memo
01:12 because it was rough, but there was something about it
01:15 that was cool.
01:16 - It was pretty special.
01:18 ♪ I used to know ♪
01:21 ♪ But I'm not sure now ♪
01:24 ♪ What I was made for ♪
01:27 - It is top three hardest songs I've ever had to record.
01:33 It's not even that it's high.
01:37 It is high in my range, but it's not about that.
01:41 It's about the delivery.
01:43 I was trying to do a very specific thing with my voice,
01:46 which was this like very soft, held back,
01:50 upper range falsetto,
01:52 where as I could have belted it,
01:55 I could have sung it more out,
01:57 I could have sung it in more of a choral choir type.
02:02 ♪ Da da da da ♪
02:04 And instead it was like a.
02:05 ♪ Da da da da ♪
02:07 ♪ I used to float ♪
02:10 It's really hard to do.
02:12 Honestly, it's really hard to do.
02:13 It's really hard to sound good
02:16 and be enunciating the words correctly and enough.
02:21 - I remember that being a big part of the song
02:23 was making sure that it was intelligible.
02:25 - I wanted you to understand what I was saying.
02:27 Could have literally done like a.
02:29 ♪ I used to float ♪
02:31 ♪ And now I ♪
02:32 But that's not what the song wanted, you know?
02:35 And I could have done a.
02:35 ♪ I used to float ♪
02:37 There's so many ways I could have sung it,
02:39 but none of it worked the way that this kind of heartbroken,
02:43 almost like you were just crying
02:45 and now you're singing delivery was.
02:47 And it was the hardest choice
02:49 of all of the choices I could have made.
02:51 ♪ I used to float ♪
02:53 ♪ And now I'm just falling ♪
02:56 ♪ I used to float ♪
02:59 ♪ And now I'm just healing ♪
03:02 I had this exact vision for what I wanted it to sound like.
03:05 And I got it there and I feel really proud.
03:07 I think it's one of the best,
03:09 if I can be honest and self whatever,
03:12 I feel like it's one of my best vocal performances
03:15 I've ever given.
03:16 - But you were harsh about it.
03:17 She would, we'd do the whole vocal and comp it
03:19 and we'd be working on the production.
03:21 She'd go home for the night
03:22 and she'd come back the next day and she'd be like,
03:23 "I need to re-record this line, this line, and this line."
03:25 - Yeah, when I was starting out, I had one way of singing
03:27 and that's how I sang.
03:28 And everything that I sang, I just sang it
03:30 how I knew how to sing it.
03:31 And now I have all these choices
03:33 and I can play with my instrument.
03:35 Like I have an instrument now that I can play with
03:37 and it's really amazing and it's really fun,
03:40 but it's definitely hard.
03:42 And I would say that "I don't know how to feel" was brutal
03:45 'cause it goes, it does that ascending,
03:49 ♪ 'Cause I, 'cause I, I don't know how to feel ♪
03:53 And it's so high and you're kind of sliding at the note.
03:57 What is the key?
03:58 - C. - C?
03:59 ♪ I, I don't know how to feel ♪
04:03 - That how, how, oh, oh, you guys,
04:11 I must've done that shit like a gazillion times.
04:15 ♪ I don't know ♪
04:16 And the, oh my gosh, I'm so glad it's over.
04:20 I'm so glad I recorded it
04:22 and I don't have to record it again.
04:24 The run was definitely tough.
04:25 I think it was tough because it's in head voice
04:28 and for me, runs are much easier in kind of a lower register
04:32 in like a mid chest voice.
04:35 ♪ 'Cause I, 'cause I ♪
04:38 That was the one that came to me initially
04:43 and I really wanted to do it, but I was like,
04:44 I don't know if I can get this one.
04:45 The second chorus was belted for a while
04:48 and that run was belted and it just didn't sound right.
04:51 It just was like, eh, this isn't what this is,
04:53 it's supposed to be.
04:54 But of course it's much easier to do that.
04:56 I was like, oh God, I have to do the soft, you know.
05:00 ♪ 'Cause I, 'cause I ♪
05:03 Okay. - Nice, dude.
05:07 - I think I'm good.
05:08 That run, it's intricate.
05:11 What is it?
05:11 ♪ 'Cause I, 'cause I ♪
05:14 ♪ 'Cause I, 'cause I ♪
05:17 It's fast, it's soft, it's back here.
05:25 It's not forward.
05:26 - Billie's ability to double track is really amazing.
05:29 There's like micro rhythms when you're double tracking
05:32 of where each syllable and pitch ends and begins
05:37 on the lead vocal that you've tracked.
05:39 And oftentimes, especially the way that Billie sings
05:42 a little jazzy, so oftentimes her delivery
05:44 is behind the beat or rushing and then behind the beat.
05:48 - It's all very purposeful.
05:49 - It is, but it's hard to-- - Double.
05:52 - Hard to double.
05:53 - It's hard to replicate.
05:54 - If you sing in a very sort of like common time,
05:58 all the notes start on the downbeat,
06:00 that's much easier to double.
06:01 She's doing really jazzy, intricate stuff.
06:03 ♪ Made me miserable ♪
06:06 To even double that is really challenging
06:11 and she'll just go after it and crush that
06:14 and then she's able to do it when she harmonizes too.
06:17 And she's got a big range.
06:19 ♪ I don't know how to feel ♪
06:23 And that's playing at the same time as the lead.
06:25 - Can you play it with the lead though?
06:27 ♪ I don't know how to feel ♪
06:30 - So even her vibrato is on the same rhythm as--
06:37 - The breaths are all matched up,
06:38 the vibrato is all matched up.
06:40 ♪ I don't know how to feel ♪
06:43 - So that's three takes at once.
06:47 ♪ Someday I might ♪
06:49 - This is just the lead, that line.
06:51 - You can barely hear it,
06:52 you can kind of just feel it in the imaging of it.
06:54 And there's a plugin called Vocaline
06:56 that will analyze a waveform
06:58 and stretch it and contract it.
07:01 And I've never used it once with Billie.
07:03 ♪ 'Cause I, I don't know how to feel ♪
07:08 ♪ I don't know how to feel ♪
07:11 - I think of sound in a very physical way.
07:14 I think that sound has a weight to it.
07:16 And I think that a perfect production
07:18 is like a perfectly balanced set of scales.
07:21 I'm just trying to keep the equilibrium.
07:23 And I feel like generally I can feel innately
07:27 when something is tipping the scale
07:29 and sort of ruining the balance of everything.
07:31 And it is all sort of like placing things really delicately
07:36 and making sure that it holds.
07:37 And then if it holds, maybe adding something else.
07:39 But oftentimes, especially from a stereo perspective,
07:42 it's like, if something's going on over here,
07:43 something's going on over here, so that it balances.
07:45 I've gone on record as saying this,
07:47 but like the fantasy is that your vocal is unbelievable
07:51 and the one instrument playing along to it,
07:54 the piano or the guitar, is great.
07:55 And that it's, you know, you're like Bob Dylan
07:58 and it's just that.
07:58 The art of production to me
08:00 is just to enhance the emotionality.
08:01 It isn't to gild a lily or something.
08:04 So we just tried to be inventive
08:06 and add to the sort of narrative components of it.
08:08 One of my favorite components of the production on this,
08:11 I've spent a lot of time just handing Billie
08:12 some instrument that's in my studio
08:14 because I'm more interested in
08:18 what she's gonna do experimenting with it.
08:20 She has less years of standing, you know,
08:24 behind a keyboard on a stage than I do.
08:26 - I don't really know what I'm doing.
08:27 - And that's exciting.
08:28 As a producer, the idea that they're gonna come up with
08:31 is so much less theoretical and I love that.
08:33 And so I have this toy, this little keyboard
08:37 that Custom Vintage gave me.
08:39 - It's literally like yellow,
08:40 it's like toy colored yellow and red,
08:43 like as if it was from Toys R Us.
08:45 We had a patch on it and I just was like fucking around.
08:47 - And I ran it through a plugin called Sketch Cassette
08:51 that I love that just fucked up the sound more,
08:55 which made it feel really good.
08:56 But she's mainly playing along to the melodies
08:58 and it is so sad.
09:00 [sad music]
09:02 Like, sorry.
09:05 That's so sad.
09:06 - Okay, sorry.
09:07 Wait, keep it.
09:08 - And here's how it's interacting with the lead.
09:11 [sad music]
09:13 When it comes to production
09:15 and recording instrumental parts,
09:17 I'm much more interested in the first pass
09:19 and the sort of guesswork that goes into that.
09:23 I'd much less like to have her sort of sit there for hours
09:26 and figure out exactly what she wants to play for the verse.
09:28 I want it to be kind of improvisational.
09:30 - Play the ending of that one.
09:32 - Just the outro?
09:33 - Yeah.
09:34 ♪ Would it be happy ♪
09:36 ♪ Something I'm not ♪
09:39 ♪ But something I can be ♪
09:40 - And it fades out.
09:41 ♪ Something I wait for ♪
09:46 - But I had to boost it so much
09:48 to even have you hear it just now.
09:49 It's so quiet in the mix.
09:51 Also underneath it are a bunch of ad libs that she did,
09:54 but they're so barely--
09:55 - Ad libs, oh my God.
09:57 I could do a whole interview about ad libs.
09:59 Nobody ever asks me about ad libs.
10:00 They make songs so special.
10:02 You don't even know, dude.
10:04 - But they're that quiet.
10:08 They're so--
10:09 ♪ Close my eyes ♪
10:14 - This one?
10:15 ♪ I don't know how to feel ♪
10:19 - And again, under the lead.
10:22 ♪ I don't know how to feel ♪
10:26 - Ah, I love that one.
10:28 ♪ I don't know how to feel ♪
10:31 ♪ Feel ♪
10:33 ♪ With somebody ♪
10:34 - Love it.
10:35 Oh, it makes me so excited.
10:37 - I had this idea for the one
10:40 on the second half of the first verse
10:41 when it says, "Taking a drive."
10:43 I love that this is here.
10:45 ♪ Taking a drive ♪
10:48 - I just wanted it to have this weird
10:49 kind of euphoric thing happening.
10:51 So I said, "Woo!"
10:53 And I recorded that.
10:54 Do you wanna hear what it sounds like with no plugins?
10:56 ♪ Woo ♪
10:58 - I forgot.
11:00 - And then I ran it through an overdrive
11:02 and a channel EQ and a reverb plugin.
11:04 It sounds like this.
11:05 ♪ Woo ♪
11:07 And then I turned it way down
11:09 and it plays at the same time as a big, thumpy drum.
11:13 A drum hitting and also a bass starting
11:15 and the three of them together.
11:17 ♪ Taking a drive ♪
11:20 ♪ I was an ideal ♪
11:23 - It does like an emotional thing to you.
11:25 I feel the same way about the little,
11:27 what reminds me of like a Nintendo DS or something.
11:30 Just this like arpeggiated organ.
11:33 - I love this.
11:35 I think this does so much for the song.
11:36 - But it plays so quietly.
11:38 It just kind of peaks out when the vocal goes away.
11:41 - It's so nostalgic to me.
11:42 - It's nostalgic.
11:43 It sounds like a, it sounds fake.
11:45 It sounds like a toy.
11:45 - It makes me wanna barf.
11:46 It's like so sentimental.
11:48 - Also a bunch of Mellotron patches.
11:53 - Reminds me of like Sims.
11:56 - I really wanted the whole thing
11:59 to sound like Animal Crossing.
12:01 I think that was a big. - Yeah, see?
12:01 - There's some really, really distant, huge guitars.
12:05 [guitar playing]
12:08 So cool.
12:10 - I love that that's hidden underneath.
12:12 - It's so funny producing music
12:13 because when you record something like that,
12:16 you inherently have to record it super loud
12:19 'cause part of the way that a guitar sounds
12:22 is the feedback.
12:23 You have to record it loud enough
12:24 that the speaker, the pickup on the guitar
12:26 is picking up the noise from the speaker.
12:27 So you're playing your normal song
12:29 and you're destroying your song
12:31 with this butt rock guitar part.
12:34 And you know as a producer that you're like,
12:37 I'm gonna chuck it as far in the background
12:39 as humanly possible.
12:40 - No one would ever think that that's in there.
12:42 - But it adds energy. - It adds so much, yeah.
12:44 - There's just energy that that's providing.
12:47 And that's sort of the, again,
12:48 that's like the physics of it.
12:50 It would never sit in that song if we had it super loud.
12:54 - Yeah, when we were writing this,
12:56 we were very, very much writing about a character
12:59 and we were writing from the perspective of a character
13:02 and her life and the way she sees the world
13:05 through her eyes and her experiences.
13:06 And it wasn't until like two days later
13:08 that I was listening to it and I was like,
13:11 this is me, this is my life and how I feel.
13:15 And it was pretty weird to like not realize
13:18 that my subconscious was doing that.
13:21 And also just that I related a lot to this character.
13:24 - I think it's an excuse to be a little braver
13:27 than you might be willing if you are writing something
13:30 that you know people are going to receive
13:32 as autobiographical. - So true.
13:34 - I think if you write a lyric like,
13:37 I'm sad again, don't tell my boyfriend.
13:39 And you know your boyfriend is gonna hear it
13:41 and think, Jesus Christ,
13:43 that takes a different amount of courage
13:45 than being like, that's Barbie.
13:47 - No, it's literally not about you.
13:49 Yeah, no, it's a character.
13:51 That's what I was, I was hitting that the next day.
13:53 ♪ I'm sad again ♪
13:56 ♪ Don't tell my boyfriend ♪
13:59 ♪ It's not what he's made for ♪
14:03 - When we were with Greta,
14:05 we saw the first 35, 40 minutes straight
14:08 that was edited at the time.
14:09 And then we saw sort of moments,
14:10 key moments that she wanted us to see.
14:12 And we were shown what at the time was the scene
14:16 that the song ends up in,
14:17 which is the now feel scene,
14:20 which made me cry watching that.
14:22 And at the time had no montage.
14:26 - Oh yeah, no montage.
14:27 - Had no life montage,
14:28 which I later found out is like footage
14:29 of the crew and cast's family members,
14:32 which is beautiful.
14:33 But at the time it was just a one shot of Margo crying.
14:37 - In this like white room.
14:38 - But we loved that moment in that line.
14:40 And she had sort of said we're missing
14:42 what she was referring to as Barbie's heart song.
14:44 So we had all that in the back of our minds
14:47 when we went into writing.
14:48 - That pressure like almost doesn't exist
14:51 when it's just us two, you know,
14:53 in the studio in his house.
14:55 Like, you know, we're eating like donuts
14:58 and like making music and playing pickleball and stuff.
15:02 It's just like the pressure of whoever the fat suits are.
15:06 I don't know.
15:07 (laughing)
15:08 Yeah, how do I quiet the noise?
15:09 I'm not really listening.
15:10 I'm not really listening.
15:11 - This is not--
15:12 - The team can attest.
15:13 - Not to throw Billy under the bus,
15:14 but you're asking how she quiets the noise
15:16 and Billy's like, what's going, who's--
15:18 - I don't know what the hell is going on.
15:19 I'm, I have--
15:20 - Very little noise gets in there.
15:22 - I have 1,461 unread texts right now.
15:27 I'm not looking at that stuff.
15:29 I never really questioned the song.
15:30 I was like, is that enough of a chorus?
15:33 Just like repeating 'cause I, 'cause I,
15:35 I don't know how to feel.
15:36 I just was like, don't know how to feel.
15:38 Like, am I saying enough?
15:39 Like, does that convey what I mean?
15:41 And I think that it so did.
15:43 I was just nervous that it wasn't, you know,
15:45 saying enough, but in a way it was like
15:47 saying way enough, you know?
15:49 It was really the perfect, like, simple way to be like,
15:53 I don't know what I'm doing, you know?
15:55 I don't know how to feel.
15:57 I don't.
15:58 And I think that it's, that's kind of
16:00 one of the most special parts of the song
16:01 is just this like simple, like, statement
16:04 that somebody could just say, I've said that.
16:06 I've said that before in my life.
16:07 I think all of us have probably been like,
16:08 I don't know how to feel.
16:10 And literally that she doesn't know how to feel,
16:13 like physically.
16:14 - We made the song early enough in the process of them
16:18 scoring the film that after we'd written the song,
16:21 they started using the melodies that we'd written
16:23 for the song in the film score.
16:25 And so there'd be scenes where there's an orchestra
16:28 playing the melodies that are in the song in the film,
16:31 kind of full circle, the orchestra that they'd recorded
16:35 of the melodies of our song that they'd put in the movie.
16:37 I was like, well, why don't, can we get a pass
16:38 of the orchestra playing just sort of chords
16:42 underneath the song so that it sort of ties
16:46 all into the film score.
16:48 This is like a breakout of like the orchestra stems.
16:50 It's like a million microphones, but.
16:52 There's some horns.
16:55 Marker Andrew, who was his composing partner,
17:04 he sent over like four tracks.
17:06 He sent over like strings, horns, CS80, harp.
17:08 - One of my favorite parts that he added
17:10 is the ascending harp.
17:12 Every time it hits it.
17:19 Oh my God, it just, it's really, I love that.
17:23 The song means a lot to me.
17:24 It means a lot to me.
17:25 I think that it's hard to like listen to, I think.
17:29 There's some things in this world that don't,
17:32 like they kind of don't stay yours,
17:35 especially when they are consumed by the public
17:38 and things like that.
17:39 And I think that this song, no matter what happens with it,
17:43 I think it'll always be mine.
17:45 And I'll feel like it's right here because it is for me.
17:50 - I think it's just about changing.
17:51 And I think when you grow and when you change
17:54 is sort of inherently an identity crisis
17:56 that sort of metamorphosis as a person,
17:59 which is like the most cathartic, important part
18:01 of living your life and aging is also this like
18:04 devastating experience and can really put you in crisis.
18:07 - Growing up is scary.
18:09 - Yeah, and growing up doesn't stop when you turn 18
18:12 or reach the height that you're gonna be
18:14 for the rest of your life.
18:15 Growing up is just lived experience,
18:17 continuing to wash over you like waves on a beach
18:20 until you're worn smooth, like beach glass, and then you die.
18:24 - Jesus Christ.
18:26 - And that's fine.
18:29 (silence)
18:31 [BLANK_AUDIO]