Life & Work with Bradley Denniston of Hollywood

Today we’d like to introduce you to Bradley Denniston

Hi Bradley, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
I was a 90’s kid… Grew up in Portland Oregon and bands like Nirvana, Smashing Pumpkins, Everclear, and Pearl Jam were really what first got me into music and wanting to create music from an early age.

When I got my first electric guitar at 12 years old, I became obsessed with music and learning every instrument… My Mom sang at church and lead the worship team on Sundays, my Dad introduced me to rock and roll,

We listened to the “oldies” station when I started working for my Dad at his glass shop at 14 years old. Back in the late 90’s, the oldie’s station played The Beatles, Rolling Stones, Soul, Funk, and Motown on repeat. Those songs and melodies are imprinted in my brain grooves…

As I got into highschool, somehow word got out that I had a drum kit at my house and a place to practice. So, naturally I became the drummer in a band, haha… I didn’t know how to play drums at all. We had an exchange student from Japan living with us at the time and he played drums! So I had him teach me some basic rock drum patterns and BOOM! I was a “drummer”.

Later, with the same group of guys we restructured the band when they found out I could sing and write… We got a new drummer and I started fronting the band. We played shows at the school, house parties, and all over the city. The band even got scouted by Capitol records back in the early 2000’s. We were a post hardcore/ scream-o type group by that time and it was a pretty crazy time to be in a band.

After all the “high school garage band”, the other guys moved on to college and serious girlfriends… So naturally that dissipated but I continued to pick up new instruments, kept writing, and “producing” (didn’t know that’s what I was doing at the time)… In my early 20’s I sold all my stuff, besides my acoustic Martin guitar and moved down to Costa Rica to live for almost a year with a friend. Lots of crazy adventures happened, I blew all my money, then came back to Portland with 0 plan and -$1,200 charged on a credit card.

By the time I was 22/ 23, I really got serious about producing music, writing, and engineering… I build multiple home studios in every house I rented. Garages became recording studios, spare room = recording studio, basement = recording studio, you get it. But It was SERIOUS. I literally had my Dad help me build walls within walls in garages and structures that didn’t exist in RENTAL properties. I was OBSESSED.

The biggest shift in making music an actual career for me came when I packed up my life and moved from Portland Oregon to Berkeley California to go to school for Sound at expression Digital Arts college in Emeryville. That was the most scary thing I ever did in my life up to that point… Costa Rica and living in a different country I think kinda prepped me for more risk.

Once I moved to the bay area, I went all in on music and a music career… I borrowed over $100,000 in student loans, both federal and private (Sallie Mae at the time) and lived off of $1,100 a month and A LOT of hustle! I was going to school 40-60 hours a week, the school was open 24/7, and when I wasn’t in class I was in studio sessions or was on Craigslist looking for gigs in music.

I remember feeling like there was NOTHING in music that was paying so I started broadening my searches on Craigslist. I went from searching “audio engineer” “music producer” jobs to “video editing” and “voice over”. I would get home from school after 12 hours at school, and respond to Craigslist gigs for another hour or two every night.

That turned into a contract for voice over with Pandora internet radio, which I did for almost 7 years as a side gig. I met a ton of great people through school, gigs, and just love for creating.

As I was about to graduate from college with a bachelors degree in “Sound Arts”, I realized I had no idea what I was going to do and had a $1,150/ mo student loan payment coming due in 90 days!

So, I did what every good entrepreneur does and got on the phone, Facebook, and anywhere else I knew people!

I ended up connecting with someone I worked at PF Changs with back when I was in Portland… She was the secretary for a company called “Mutato Muzika” (I only knew this because I saw it on her Facebook page). I thought to myself, “MUZIKA”! That sounds promising! That night, I was walking around Lake Merritt in Oakland California and I called her up to ask her about where she worked.

That turned into a internship with Mark Mothersbaugh of DEVO… Almost 5 years working with Mark at Mutato, over 3 billion dollars in box office projects, Grammy, Emmy, Golden Globe nominated projects, a platinum record for “Everything Is Awesome” on The LEGO Movie, working with artists like Thelma Houston (Motown, RCA, MCA), The Lonely Island, Tegan and Sara, Gotye, G-Eazy and so many more…

Now it’s been over 7 years since I worked with Mark and I’m now running my own company, Radium Media/ Radium Records here in Hollywood. I ABSOLUTELY LOVE the work I do with independent artists and my own music that I’m releasing as a solo artist. I’ve now worked with a bunch of great companies like Waves Audio, Antares Auto-Tune, Schwabe Digital, Mixwave, Presonus, Fender, Safari Pedals, and way too many more to mention here.

I’m really focused on creating timeless music at the moment. I’m focused on helping other artists, collaborating with innovative brands and companies that are pushing things forward and creating tools for artists. My biggest passion is creating and thriving to create at the highest levels possible.

It’s all such a trip… Music, art, fashion, tech, I love all these things and see how people are really wanting to connect in a real way again. Live music, events, workshops… I have some really cool plans and very ambitious thoughts about the future of all this art and music stuff.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Well… I went to prison for 10 years. HAHA. Just messing with you! But I’m pretty sure I could’ve when I was living down in Costa Rica when I was 20 years old with my good friend, Shaughnessy White. I was selling some weed here and there to see if I could make a profit, then I had a genius idea to try and sell something a little more “potent”… Let’s just say the local business men didn’t appreciate that too much in the beach town I lived in. Definitely thought I was going to get murdered. Is that too dark?..

But for real, the struggles of being an artist or entrepreneur in music are CONSTANT! It’s really a battle of the mind and making sure you have this completely un realistic optimism about the future and every day you’re sitting down to create…

You know, when I was in the middle of school, pouring my all into learning music technology, going more and more into debt with every passing day… I doubted myself a lot. I was even engaged to be married in the middle of it all and that person left me in the middle of the hardest time of my life. I obviously do not blame that person now, but at the time it was like the whole world was conspiring against my dreams.

There was a time when I was really on the fence about quitting my job working with Mark at Mutato and starting my own thing in music… I mean imagine the whole world thinks you have the dream job working in music and on the biggest projects in the world and you want nothing more than to go out on your own and struggle again! That seems crazy but at the time I knew I needed to get back to creating MY MUSIC. MY ART. The money matters but only to a certain point when you’re an artist. I think as an artist, I just wanted to be free. I wanted to create what I LOVED and have the time and freedom to do so.

That’s a very hard place to be… Feeling stuck.

Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I’m an artist, music producer, composer, and audio engineer… My music really is a fusion of all my skillsets and influences.

A lot of my sound leans heavy on groove, as the first instrument I really fell in love with was the drums. After going in and out with bands, I got heavy into sampling soul, funk, and jazz vinyl… That was a crazy period of my life where I just smoked weed every damn day and sampled records with my MPC 2000xl.

I think most people know me for all the content I put out taking about music production, mixing and mastering, plugins, etc. But I’m most proud of my own music I create because it’s what I think is the most personal to me…

I’ve worked on Grammy, Oscar, Emmy, and Golden Globe nominated work. I’ve scored Netflix original series like “Cannon Buster” and “Abstract: The Art Of Design”, worked on dozens of commercials for Lexus, Dodge, Microsoft, and even won Telly Awards and Clio awards for music I’ve done for advertising…

I’m all over the place with this music stuff but it’s because I really love it all and never want to be pigeon holed into one thing in music and art. I’m a human, I like a lot of stuff!

Can you tell us more about what you were like growing up?
Growing up I was super quiet and analytical until I was around 11-12 years old… Then I became really strong willed and outgoing.

I always loved making people laugh, good conversations, being around good people, good food, music, and atmosphere.

I was always friends with all types of people… I’ve always enjoyed bringing people together.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bradleyhd/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@RadiumRecordsHollywood
• Other: https://open.spotify.com/artist/53kQBsEHAWWgAJtXLC37fh?si=q28wg5hBTuC6ASZsH3-Ehw