A Masterclass in Creativity -- the Euphoria Soundtrack, Working with Beyonce, and What It Means to Make Music That Actually Moves People
Labrinth -- the British producer, songwriter, and artist born Timothy McKenzie -- has built one of the most distinctive and emotionally powerful bodies of work in contemporary music. His soundtrack for Euphoria introduced him to a generation that hadn't yet caught up with a career that already included massive commercial hits, BRIT Award wins, collaborations with Tinie Tempah, Sam Smith, and Emeli Sande, and a creative restlessness that has always pushed him somewhere most producers aren't willing to go.
In this conversation with Elmo, Labrinth opens up about his creative process in a way that is rare -- specific, honest, and illuminating about how he actually works and why he makes the choices he makes. This is a true masterclass in creativity from one of the most gifted and least-categorizable artists working today.
"I don't make music for the reaction. I make it because something needs to come out. The reaction is someone else's business."
The full story of how the Euphoria score came together -- the conversations with Sam Levinson, the specific emotional brief he was given, and how he translated the show's texture into music that became inseparable from the series itself. His account of what it meant to score something at that level of cultural intensity, and what the process looked like day to day in a way that no press interview has captured.
His account of what it was actually like to be in the creative orbit of one of music's most exacting and visionary artists -- what she expects, what she gives back, and what the collaboration produced. The specific details of how that working relationship functions and what it taught him about his own standards and capabilities. One of the most candid accounts of working with Beyonce you will find from anyone who has done it.
How Labrinth actually makes music -- not the romanticized version but the real one, with its routines and dead ends and sudden breakthroughs. His specific approach to starting a track, finding the emotional core, and knowing when something is done. The frameworks he has developed over years of working across pop, R&B, film, and orchestral music that allow him to move fluidly between worlds without losing what makes him distinctly him.
His account of where he comes from -- the East London upbringing, the church music, the self-taught production skills, and the specific moment he understood what kind of artist he was going to be. The early career choices that shaped everything that followed, and the times he almost went in a completely different direction. The origin story of one of music's most singular voices.
How Labrinth thinks about the tension between commercial success and artistic integrity -- not as a philosophical debate but as a practical daily question he has had to answer throughout his career. His specific account of the choices that cost him commercial opportunities and the ones that opened creative ones, and how he has learned to hold both without letting either one define him.
Labrinth's answer to the deepest question in the room -- why music matters, what it does to people, and what he is actually trying to give someone when they listen to what he makes. His perspective is rooted in faith, in family, and in a specific understanding of music as something spiritual and communal rather than just commercial. One of the most fully considered answers to this question you will hear from any working artist.
The Euphoria origin story: how the conversation with Sam Levinson started, what the creative brief actually was, and the specific moment Labrinth understood what the score needed to be. His account of building the sound from nothing -- the instrumentation choices, the tonal decisions, and the process of making music that could live inside one of the most visually intense shows on television without fighting it.
On making "Beneath Your Beautiful" with Emeli Sande: the specific story of how that song was written, what it felt like to be in the room when it came together, and what happened when it became a hit that neither of them fully anticipated. One of the clearest windows into what it feels like when a song arrives fully formed -- and what you do with it when it does.
The faith conversation: Labrinth is unusually candid about the role of faith in his creative life -- not as background noise but as a genuine organizing principle. His account of how his spiritual life shapes what he makes and why he makes it, and what it means to him to make music that he believes has a purpose beyond entertainment. Rare honesty from an artist who doesn't often talk about this publicly.
On what he can't teach: Labrinth's honest account of the things in his creative process that he cannot explain or transfer -- the intuitive leaps, the decisions that feel right without a reason, and the moments where he simply doesn't know why something works but knows that it does. A window into the genuinely mysterious part of how great music gets made.