Extremely Grateful: An Interview with Jason Graves
Jason Graves has had a busy couple of years, between composing the The Dark Pictures: The Devil In Me soundtrack, being nominated for the Moss: Book II soundtrack, and watching as Dead Space re-enters both the game and game music scene. Fortunately, he did have enough time to chat with me about his career, his work process, and his future aspirations.
Jason, you’ve been very busy lately. How would you describe your career now compared to a few years ago?
Three words: Busy, varied and extremely grateful! Ok, so that was four words. Honestly, I’ve been doing this long enough now to see waves of work come and go and prepare myself accordingly. Sometimes, you feel like you need a clone to meet deadlines. Other times, you’re thankful for a small breather…but hopefully not too small! Busy is always good.
Let’s start with your soundtrack for Moss: Book II, which is up for “Outstanding Achievement in Original Music Composition” at the 26th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards. You also composed the original Moss soundtrack, so what was your mindset for Moss: Book II?
I had the benefit of composing the score for the first Moss, so it was a matter of picking up where I left off. As usual, I wanted to be sure to grow the small, soloist-based score in a logical way that related to the game’s story and character arcs, and that meant augmenting the instrumentation. I scaled up the violin from Book 1 to a cello in Book 2. I used a baby grand piano instead of a small, celtic harp for most of the score’s harmonic background. I also greatly expanded on the main theme from the original score, harmonically, and added something like 10-15 new, smaller themes for different characters and locations.
What was your favorite video game soundtrack from 2022?
I really enjoyed Yann Van Der Cruyssen’s music for Stray. Of course, I’m a huge animal lover and own seven cats, amongst other species in my menagerie, so I also enjoyed playing the game!
Next, let’s talk about The Dark Pictures: The Devil In Me, which is the 4th game in The Dark Pictures Anthology and the final game in Season 1. You’ve scored all 4 games in the anthology, which have been annual releases, so I would imagine that the turn-around time for the soundtracks has to be pretty tight. What practices or processes do you have for composing under such tight deadlines?
There always seems to be a deadline looming, but my daily schedule is fairly structured, with me working 9am-6:30pm M-F with plenty of time off during evenings and weekends. I’ve found, over time, that having that structure and, more importantly, the downtime of NOT working is paramount to both my mental well-being and keeping the creative juices flowing. As long as I have a balanced work/life schedule, I can easily keep up with deadlines and deliveries.
How do the soundtracks in The Dark Pictures Anthology compare to each other? Do you have any common themes or motifs that are shared between games or do you approach each one as its own, separate entity?
They are definitely each their own thing. It’s important that the music be unique to each story because it characterizes people, places, and the core narrative. I feel quite blessed to be able to explore these worlds together with Barney Pratt, the Audio Director at Supermassive Games. We have quite the amazing time trying out different things to make each title stand on its own, musically speaking.
For example, Man of Medan was entirely in 3/4 time, representing the rising and falling of the ocean waves and the tide. Little Hope consisted of a lonely, minimal score using aged and detuned instruments synonymous with early settlers in New England.
For House Of Ashes, we used a very simple pitching motif that injected fear in the player. It played on pretty much any instrument and existed in the warfare, vampire, and alien sections of the game. Plus, we completely changed instrumentation from orchestral to 100% synthesized sounds as the narrative exposition progressed. With The Devil In Me, we tinged the score with a noir-like nod to Bernard Herrmann for general vibe.
The Dark Pictures Anthology has been to Salem in 1692, Chicago in the late 18th Century, 1970s USA, and through to present-day and into sci-fi. We’ve covered the South Pacific, Iraq, New England, ancient Sumerian temples, psychos, demons, and aliens. And that’s just the first season!
Listening to The Devil In Me soundtrack, I noticed the use of clocks in a few tracks. What’s the significance of time for this game in particular?
There are a lot of time-based events in the game, and you need to make a good decision or someone dies. So, there’s plenty of pressure! There are also a lot, and I mean a LOT, of mannequins throughout the game to up the creep factor, and sometimes, they are animatronic, moving on their own with lots of mechanical sounds. So, I really got a two-for-one with the clock/machine sounds in the score. They represent both the passing of time and the creepy animatronics in the game.
What are some of your favorite moments or experiences from composing The Devil In Me?
I really did enjoy playing and recording as many live instruments as possible for the score. Most of the creepy string effects in the score are me “playing” different string instruments in my studio. I use that term loosely since I am definitely not a string player, but I know enough to be dangerous…and incredibly spooky! I was also able to record live piano, harp, vibraphone and celeste, which do a lot of “time passing” kinds of musical ideas as well.
Last, but not least, I want to talk about Dead Space, which recently received a full remake, with additional new music from Trevor Gureckis. Did you know they were planning a remake? Did you work with Trevor at all for the new tracks?
I knew there was a remake in the works, and that my original score was kept intact. I didn’t have the pleasure of working with Trevor, but I’m sure he did a great job!
I’ve heard that you recorded your own library of sounds and instruments for the Dead Space soundtrack. Can you explain that process and why you went to such lengths to create the soundtrack?
I needed very specific control over the orchestra due to the interactive music system. The score is essentially over eight hours of music, but it’s layered in such a way, in-game, that there are four distinct stereo music tracks playing back all the time. The game engine turns these tracks up and down depending on the on-screen action. There was a decent live music budget, but not enough to record more than eight hours of music. Maybe two hours, max. To put it in perspective, most feature film budgets are for only 60-70 minutes.
I decided to design, record and build my own custom orchestral instruments, recorded with a live orchestra but playable on a keyboard, in real time, the same way I would play a piano. The end result was something like 6 recording sessions, more than 20 hours of material and something insane like 85,000+ individual samples stretched out over a 4 year period between the first two Dead Space games.
In another interview, you mentioned the use of “aleatoric music” in Dead Space. Can you explain that for people who aren’t familiar with the term?
It’s essentially a Latin term for “dice” or “chance.” It’s all about injecting chance into music, which is usually incredibly specific about what note you play, how long you play it and how loud or soft it is. Typical aleatoric notation could look similar to standard notation, but with instructions like “play highest note as loud as possible” or “perform these six notes in any order as fast as you can.” These open-ended instructions yield exciting, often frenetic sounding results that were perfect for a horror title.
Looking at your career, you’ve definitely established yourself as a horror composer, but are there any other gaming genres that you would like to explore?
I’ve always wanted to compose a fantasy score, and that wish has been fulfilled twice now with Moss and Moss: Book II. They are incredibly well made, fairytale-set VR titles that allowed me to really stretch out and compose with lush harmonies and sweeping themes.
Another genre that's sounded interesting for quite a few years was modern military games. I was given the opportunity to compose music for Call of Duty: Modern Warefare 2 last year and also have new music coming out with the Season Two expansion Feb 15.
Now it’s more about specific developers as opposed to genres. Naughty Dog has been on my dream developer list for quite a while, as well as The Chinese Room. They are both very creative and story-driven, which really appeals to me!
Do you have any thoughts or advice for new video game composers?
Never stop writing music. Music composition is like anything else creative–you need to put in the hours and output as much material as you can. It’s all about building up that creative muscle, just like you were an athlete, training for the Olympics. And make sure your music is easy to find and listen to!
Two-time British Academy Award-winning composer Jason Graves is renowned for his textural concept scores and innovative orchestration in cinematic narrative games such as The Dark Pictures Anthology, Moss 1&2, Tomb Raider, Far Cry Primal, Until Dawn, The Order: 1886, and the Dead Space trilogy. His repertoire is truly diverse, from aleatoric and sweeping orchestral journeys in space, to haunting and immersive soundscapes in historical, gothic and supernatural worlds, to manipulating ancient instruments in a natural environment and crafting whimsical waltzes for an intimate pastoral palette. Following his additional music contributions to Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II, Graves is currently scoring music for Season 2.