Part 2

Before you started making music together, did you in any form exchange concrete ideas, goals, or strategies? Generally speaking, what are your preferences when it comes to planning vs spontaneity in a collaboration?

Adrián: We began to get to know each other by sharing our tracks during the composition process. For people like us, there's probably no better way to understand each other.

Nevertheless, once our relationship became more solid, we started sharing many things together. Thomas Lemmer is now one of my closest friends, even though we haven't met in person yet!

Thomas: No, as Adrián said. We just started sharing our first ideas and it developed from there. There was no real strategy in the beginning. It was just this “One Vision” that we both shared to produce something sonically awesome. This “One Vision” drove us through the process and led to the album name.

Describe the process of working together, please. What was different from your expectations and what did the other add to the music?

Adrián: Working with Thomas is very easy in terms of personal connection. We usually liked each other's ideas upon the very first listening. Some things required additional work to align with our tastes, but those were the exceptions. I believe the creation process of this album was quite speedy, at least in my view.

Thomas: I fully agree with Adrián. What was different from my expectation was, that we actually ended up producing a full album. At first, we just thought about producing one track. But it worked so well, and we both had such a great connection that we literally couldn’t stop.

Is there a piece which shows the different aspects you each contributed to the process particularly clearly?

Adrán: I believe the album fuses our tastes at a very even 50/50 rate on every track. Some tracks originated from my ideas, while others were brought to the album by Thomas, but the overall picture is a solid 50/50 balance, as I mentioned.

Thomas: I agree. We played a lot of “ping pong” sharing our ideas while some original ideas came from Adrián and others from myself.

What tend to be the best collaborations in your opinion – those with artists you have a lot in common with or those where you have more differences? What happens when another musician takes you outside of your comfort zone?

Adrián: I believe collaborations are always a positive endeavour; everyone can contribute to make an idea more substantial. I think collaborating with a musician whose taste aligns closely with yours is easier and helps you reach your own perfection more quickly.

Working with people who offer a completely different perspective can be more challenging, but with patience and intention, I'm quite sure you can create something very unique. However, it may not necessarily be something easily accessible to a friendly listener (hehehe).

Thomas: It could be more creative working with artists you don’t have a lot in common. However, in our case, we specifically focused on each other’s strengths and thus the whole project benefitted from it.

However, we had tracks, where we thought of inviting other musicians to support us. This was the case for the intro track and the song “Maybe” where the singer Roo J supported us. Also, on “Waiting for you”, we invited Andreas Bach for a guitar solo. These tracks are a great example if you invite others that contribute things to a track, we both never could.

Decisions between creatives often work without words. How did this process work in this case?

Adrián: After a while, Thomas Lemmer and I began to provide each other with comprehensive feedback on our ideas. In the end, we used many words to determine the best direction for our tracks.

The 'without words' aspect of it stems from my confidence in Thomas's ability to do what's best for our track.

Thomas: As Adrián said, we had a lot of communication going on. But because of our remote working process, most of our ideas were created without anyone interfering with it.

What are your thoughts on the need for compromise vs standing by one's convictions? How did you resolve potential disagreements in this collaboration?

Adrián: Throughout the entire album-making process, we had one or two significant disagreements, which I believe is a very low ratio for a project like this. Sometimes, we sought feedback from third parties, which greatly helped us when we had doubts about something specific.

However, as I mentioned, I believe everything flowed quite smoothly throughout the entire process.

Thomas: We had some disagreements, but these were very little, as Adrián said. Since it’s all a matter of taste in most of these cases, we thought, why not adding these different versions or ideas as a bonus track on the album. This is what we did for some of these tracks.

Was/Is this collaboration fun – does it need to be?

Adrián: This collaboration has been and continues to be very exciting for me, more than just fun. It's a significant experience for me to grow as an artist. I hope our album achieves some success, I won't deny that, but the real value lies in the process of bringing it to life and, without a doubt, in getting to know Thomas Lemmer.

Thomas: I very much enjoyed the creative process with Adrián and his different approach to producing music. So, yes, it was a lot of fun and ultimately, I think that’s also an important aspect.

But there are always tasks involved that are just typical work tasks, but that’s completely fine. I also learned so much from Adrián throughout the process.

Do you find that thanks to this collaboration, you changed certain parts of your process or your outlook on certain creative aspects?

Adrián: For sure, nowadays I actually feel the need to continue working with Thomas in some way. I believe the shared vision of music we have goes beyond each of us individually.

Moreover, I've learned some secret tips to creating hits from him that I'm not going to share with anyone (haha).

Thomas: Haha ... I can only agree. I really feel continuing on something new with Adrián as soon as we can. Of course, there are things I learned from him. But I find it much more exciting to just ask him to do his magic.

I wish some day we’ll get the chance working in the studio together on something.

Collaborating with one's heroes can be a thrill or a cause for panic. Do you have any practical experience with this and what was it like?

Adrián: Well, I believe the first thing when you collaborate with a hero or someone higher up in the industry than you is to do your best to forget that aspect. Ultimately, you must be comfortable with yourself and your inner self to bring your musicality to life through the speakers.

It's an emotional experience, and for that, you should strive to work without fear, unless you want to express that fear in your music.

Thomas: To be honest, I pretty much felt under pressure. But I would certainly enjoy it.