AMANDA KRIEG THOMAS - MUSIC SYNC. EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW.
James Kennedy interviews veteran music supervisor Amanda Krieg Thomas about the music sync industry. They discuss the process of music supervision, advice for artists, streaming, recent strikes, and how AI affects the value of art.
James Kennedy Let's get into it, and welcome to the show, Amanda Krieg Thomas. Thank you so much for giving us your time. How are you doing?
Amanda Krieg Thomas I'm so good. Thank you so much for having me, James. I appreciate it.
James Kennedy I appreciate you giving us your time because I know you are super, super busy crushing it on all of those projects and many more. So we're super thankful to have you today. For people who don't know, before we jump into the broader issues and stuff, what is music supervision? What is it you do for a living, essentially?
Amanda Krieg Thomas Yeah, so it can be a lot of different things. I sort of explain it: I get hired by a film or a TV show to oversee all elements of music on that project. And that can be really anything from what a lot of people think about, like pitching songs for scenes—whether it's a big scene like a montage or something in the background—coming up and working with the creators on ideas for those, doing all the clearances, obtaining the rights, and doing all the paperwork and research involved in that process.
But then it can also include planning for on-camera performances—if there's a band playing, or someone singing, or someone quoting lyrics, or any of that. And sometimes it also includes working with the composer, helping get them hired, helping liaise with them and the director or the showrunner as needed, and just helping that process along. On some projects, it ends up being one or two of those things. On some projects, it's kind of all of those things. Really anything that falls under the umbrella of music on a particular project, a music supervisor is usually involved in some way or another. So every day is a little bit different, every fire is a little bit different, but that's kind of what makes it fun most of the time.
James Kennedy Well, it's a world that I think I should know more about, being an active musician for the past 20 years. And I've also placed quite a few syncs myself in TV shows and adverts around the world and stuff like that. So you'd think I'd know more about it. But it's still very much a mystery what you guys get up to within the four walls that you work within. I imagine you in some kind of evil villain's cave with a witch's cauldron, whipping up your black magic. It's not a part of the industry that's as visible as most of the other parts. So can you enlighten us? What is it you guys get up to on an average day?
Amanda Krieg Thomas Yeah, I mean, that's pretty accurate. It often feels like I am in a cave because these days I am mostly just staring at my computer and sending email after email. But on some days, we receive a lot of emails from editors on various different projects saying, "Oh, we need a song for this montage," or "We need a song for this restaurant, it needs to be background and instrumental." So we're working on searches like that, coming up with creative ideas.
Sometimes that process is as simple as pulling from our own library, sometimes it's on Spotify, and sometimes we're emailing a lot of our contacts at labels and publishers. Because if the scene they want to put music in involves someone getting murdered or doing drugs, we have to do a bunch of extra research to make sure whatever we're sending to the editors on a show is probably going to clear. We don't want to get into a situation where someone falls in love with a song and then all of a sudden, whoops, that artist never approves drug use. So all of that is involved in creative searching.
Other times we're working on tough clearances. I'm getting emails from different labels and publishers asking, "Can you send us more information about this?" or "Is this fee the best that you can do?" and we're going back and forth on that. A lot of times I am emailing with my producers saying, "Hey guys, this is what an episode looks like in terms of cost—we're very over budget or very under budget. What do you want to do? How do we sort of manage this in the big picture? Do you love the song, do you not?"
Some days we're reading scripts and getting ready for episodes or a film to shoot, which means we're looking at scripts and identifying, "Okay, they're singing a song here," or "There's a club scene here." What are the things we need to prepare for that to happen? Maybe it's pulling ideas for that, reaching out to the director, asking what they have in mind, and if they want music or not.
And then other times, when we finish episodes, there's a lot of paperwork to prepare for that—making sure we have all the clearances from what was used, making sure the music editor has the information about what was used for the cue sheet, and sending everything off to the studios to say, "This is done, here you go."
So it's kind of a little of everything depending on the phases of a project. Right now we have two that are finishing, so we're working on wrapping up paperwork because they're finishing final mixes and getting ready to air. Then we've got one or two that are kind of in the thick of post-production, so we're getting a lot of creative searches and doing a lot of clearances for those. And then one that's preparing to start shooting, so we're reading scripts and making sure that on the production side—if there's a choir singing—we start getting ahead of what they're doing and how that's going.
It really changes day to day depending on the state of the project, but overall it's probably a lot more emails and a lot less listening to music than a lot of people assume the job is. You're mostly managing a lot of different parts of the puzzle, so music listening is only one piece of this greater project.
James Kennedy It's so interesting that you say that because I feel like that's become the reality for everybody in the arts now, isn't it? Most musicians that I speak to—and I can certainly vouch for it myself—spend more time doing emails now as well, rather than playing guitar or writing songs.
Amanda Krieg Thomas I totally agree. The entertainment industry is really a business, and the people who tend to thrive in it are the people that can do a little bit of both. They have a creative mindset and love that part of it, but they also have an understanding that there is a business side. Whether it's how to write an email or a specialized skill like how to clear a song, they go hand in hand and you can't really forget about one. Honestly, sometimes the business and strategic side ends up taking over more of my day. Everyone might have a different answer to this, but for me, I think that skill set is really what has helped my career more than having good or cool music taste. Knowing how to be a manager, work with difficult personalities, be a good team player, and be solution-oriented—those are really the skills over having a cool music library that I think have helped me.
James Kennedy That's so interesting. We talk about it in the band all the time. We'd rather have a drummer that can actually turn up on time and do the job without getting us kicked out of the club than be the best drummer in the world. People and clients need to know that you're going to get it delivered on time, that all the clearances are going to be tied up, and that there aren't going to be any last-minute surprises. There are so many parallels with that on every other ladder of the music industry.
One thing that I've never been able to understand with you guys is: how the hell do you make sense of all of the music that there is out there? Because I imagine you must get so inundated with submissions and music from all different directions, as well as your own discoveries. How do you organize all that in a way that you can actually make sense of it when a search comes in?
Amanda Krieg Thomas Oh my gosh, well, I kind of don't know. The nice thing is that in doing this for as many years as I have and working on as many shows as I have, I find myself going back to past searches quite often. I listen to Spotify and iTunes, which is a little bit organized, but I am very meticulously organized when I am working on a show. When I have a creative need for a specific show, I might pull a bunch of ideas for way more than that show needs, but that same search or something similar could come up in one year, two years, or tomorrow. So I end up going back to a lot of past searches.
In terms of making sense of a lot of the music, the shows really help me focus. On my own, I try to keep up with some of what's new and some of what comes through. You're right in that I get hundreds of emails—at least probably 100 emails a day of music, and probably at least two emails every day from a brand new company, artist, or manager saying, "Will you use my music?" It really adds up to the point that I can't make sense of a lot of it. But if something feels specific and I think, "Oh wow, I've never seen someone have that before," I may not have time to listen to it right then, but I will save it.
And then you just never know when that search will come up—like needing vintage music, or Thai pop music from a specific era—and I'll remember that one person sent me something, look in my "world music" folder, and go back and search for it. But in terms of just general listening, I've kind of given up on listening to it all and responding to it all. I try to save emails as best I can, go back through things we've done in the past, and use that as a jumping-off point for something new I'm working on.
For better and for worse—really for better, because I like it—I work on a lot of period-set TV shows, which limits the pool in a way. It helps me not feel that pressure to know everything coming out in every genre. If one show doesn't go past 1991, I won't be using music from later than '91 or 2013, which helps me prioritize and focus on what I am listening to. I kind of love having those rules. If I was working on a contemporary show, I would need to find some rules to put on myself or I would just get kind of overwhelmed.
James Kennedy It must be insane, the amount of content that you must have to store away—not only on your computer, but in the back of your brain somewhere—from all the stuff that you've heard over the years. It really is a superpower. It's kind of like a dark art that I know a little bit about, but I can't fathom how you manage to do it.
Amanda Krieg Thomas It's all about email folders. I can't keep it all in my head either, so I just have lots of email folders that I try to draw on when the time comes. So yes, it is kind of a dark art. People who do have it all in their heads, I salute you, but I rely mostly on email folders.
James Kennedy Okay, that makes a lot of sense. Well, riddle me this one: I'm dying to know what you make of this. When I was doing it, we used to have briefs that would come in on a daily basis from sub-publishers around the world. They can be very specific to anyone that hasn't seen one of these sync briefs. This one was for an advert set in the woods; they wanted something kind of earthy, preferably a banjo, the word "love" to feature in the chorus, a change from major to minor, and a certain tempo and arrangement—very, very detailed.
By a stroke of a miracle, I actually had that song! It was incredible. I was like, "This is a gift from God, I've got this song, I've got this sync," so I sent it off to them saying, "You're not going to believe this, this song ticks all of the boxes." And they didn't choose it. So what's happening there?
Amanda Krieg Thomas I get it, it is hard out there. The searches are specific, and you just never know. When you have that moment, it's like, "Oh my God, this is amazing," but on the other side, there are usually a bunch of people who all have their own opinions.
One of the interesting things is how everybody can hear songs differently. There was one song that ended up being the main title for a show I worked on a few years ago. I remember one of the producers said, "This is it, this is the song, I love it, it feels so wistful and hopeful, but cathartic and optimistic." And the other producer said, "Oh wow, to me that song is just really sad and melancholy." It was just one example of how different people can hear the same song differently.
There might be something that someone pitches to me, and I have that moment where I think, "Oh my God, this is the song, I love this song, it works so well." But then the editor, the producer, or whoever else might hear it and say, "I don't know, it's not doing the same thing for me." Music is such a personal experience to everyone, whether you know about music or don't. On one hand, I love collaborating with people who are really musical. I don't have any ego about a pitch from me or whatever.
A lot of people think music supervisors get hired and then everybody on a show says, "Oh, you're the music supervisor, we're going to listen to your musical taste." It is shockingly rare how often something where I thought, "Oh, this was my idea," actually makes it to the finish line, because so many people just experience music differently and it's so dear to so many people.
When I hear stories where you had a song for such a specific brief and it felt so good, my heart goes out to you. I was on a panel and a friend of mine said this—so I can't take credit—but he said, "Every sync is a snowflake." Because the circumstances—from the pitch company and the publisher sending the song, through me getting it and sending it through, to the producer seeing it—there are so many variable factors that can lead to one song either landing it or being kicked out of the running. Out of so many songs in the world, every sync is a snowflake.
It's either magical or fatalist. When it hits, it's magical. But when I hear stories like that, as a supervisor I want to find a spot for that song and get the win, especially with smaller companies. But the circumstances are crazy; it's always so specific and mercurial to have it all come together.
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James Kennedy That's a great point, I love the idea that every sync is a snowflake. So many things are like that, and I don't think people truly appreciate that there are so many variables that all have to align at the same time in order for these magical moments to happen. I think it's great that you raised that point, because I know the frustration of being an artist, really believing in your music, and wanting it to get placed. But I also know how difficult it is on the other side of the table when you're the publisher placing it, because you're not the final arbiter of whether it gets picked or not. You can pitch it and put your passion and energy behind it, but there are so many different layers it's got to go through to actually reach the finish line. I would have thought as a music supervisor that the final decision lied with you, but clearly not.
Amanda Krieg Thomas No, almost never. Most music supervisors will say that we are really hired to serve the vision of the showrunner. Often that vision includes music in some way—they have songs that they maybe didn't write into the script, but they have something in mind. We are the music supervisors, but our job is really serving a greater vision that isn't ours.
James Kennedy Yeah, that makes sense, that's a good point. On that point, then, do you think it's fair to say that because of that, the music supervision and music sync part of the music industry is one of the few places—if not the only place—within the music industry that is in fact a true meritocracy?
I say that because if you've got a scene in a movie or an advert, and Coldplay submit a song for it, but Coldplay's song doesn't really fit the vision, but an unsigned band from the back end of beyond has a song that fits perfectly, then ultimately the unsigned band that doesn't have any clout or exposure will get the placement because it serves that broader vision. In that sense, any artist at any level has got the same chance of getting a song placed if it fits perfectly. Is that fair to say, or am I completely off with that?
Amanda Krieg Thomas I think yes and no. Some showrunners and creators very much believe that there is something to a recognizable band and a recognizable sound. To that extent, if you're serving the vision of a showrunner who thinks that way, and they feel like a spot really needs a recognizable song or artist, then your hands are a little tied.
On the flip side, when you are on a team where there is openness, things like social following or how big your shows are don't matter. When you are with someone who wants the best song for the scene and doesn't have a recognizable directive, it really comes down to what is going to work and feel good in that scene. Socials don't matter in that case.
Sometimes there is a director or studio that comes to you and says, "We want you to find artists with this," or "We want it to be recognizable," so that does happen. Sometimes I'm trying to replace Queen, and on the internet someone will respond and say, "I'm an indie band and I sound just like Queen, why don't you just use me?" The answer is, I wish I could, but Queen is Queen. Most of the time it's very hard to replace that with an indie band, even if it's less expensive, available, and clearable. You run into situations where a team says, "This is what we need for this particular spot," and your hands are tied more than some people think.
But when you are on shows or have spots within a show that are much more open, we're not looking at socials or where you're touring. We are just listening to the song and saying, "Yeah, this is what we need to do." To that point, when those opportunities are open, it is a meritocracy in that way. If we hear something that works, we're going to try it and pitch it.
James Kennedy And it can be—and has been—a complete career maker for many artists, can't it? It can take an artist from complete obscurity and throw them into the stratosphere by having their song attached to what becomes a classic advert, a cult movie, or a TV show.
Amanda Krieg Thomas Yeah, absolutely. That's why as supervisors we look for those moments. There is a magic to those moments when they happen. We love to find those spots where a new song no one's heard of hits in a way where it really blows up. Sometimes you're with a team where that's not their directive, and that's fine too, but it is always really special when that happens and when we can be a part of that for a newer artist.
James Kennedy I can imagine the glowing sense of reward when you see that happen.
The music industry has changed completely in the past 20 years with the advent of the internet, digital, and streaming. How has this affected what you do on your side of the industry? Do the mechanics still pretty much work the same, or has digital made it easier or harder?
Amanda Krieg Thomas I first got into supervision around 2008 or 2009, so I can only really speak to what I've seen since then. On a big-picture level, people I've worked for talk a lot about how fees have gone way down from when nobody had heard of supervision, and now they're just going lower and lower. That's kind of interesting.
What I've seen in my time is that music went from something that nobody knew about to something that a lot of people really want to do. I've seen many more people want to be music supervisors than when I started, and there's been an explosion of sync companies. When I started, which really wasn't that long ago, people were still sending CDs to the offices I worked for, and I was going through CDs and pulling tracks off them. Now it's all digital.
Because sync and music supervision have become much more visible, there are so many smaller sync companies where someone says, "Oh, I know five or six bands that have albums and can write music, I'm going to start a sync company." So I've definitely seen an influx of sync companies, music, and people wanting to be music supervisors.
I think it's interesting that there is still a lot of confusion about what music supervisors actually do. Because "music supervisor" as a title has become so hot, people will get DJs or artists and say, "This person is music supervising this giant film." Okay, well, Ariana Grande doesn't actually know how to music supervise. I'm sure she has music, undoubtedly has relationships, and can certainly suggest songs. But music supervision isn't just picking the cool song for the cool moment and breaking the band.
It's been interesting to watch these influxes of people interested in sync and supervision, yet there's a persistent misunderstanding of the business and legal asks. We are not lawyers, but there is a very prominent business side to what we do that gets lost in the greater picture.
Really, the biggest changes I've seen have come in the last few years. We had a global pandemic, a year or two of things going back to normal, and then last year we had two major strikes—the SAG-AFTRA strike and the Writers strike—which shut down production for the better part of a year, and it's still not fully back. Everybody thought the entertainment industry would bounce back the way it did after the pandemic—because after fall 2020 into 2021, once everybody could go back into production, we were busier than ever.
It's an interesting time now because all of those things remain true: supervision remains a very sexy career and music remains very sexy on a PR level, but there is less content coming out. I hope it comes back the way it was. I feel very fortunate to have the projects that I have, but right now in the industry there's a lot of uncertainty about whether it will get back to where it was in terms of content output. Friends who work at labels and publishers tell me their higher-ups are asking, "Isn't it back yet? Where are all the syncs and placements?" They're having to report that it's just not back in the same way it came back after the pandemic.
It's a really interesting time right now for film, TV, and any jobs in film and TV. That's the headline of what I saw when I started versus what I've been seeing the past couple of years.
James Kennedy Well, you've done a hell of a lot since 2008, mate, I've got to say. You haven't been resting on your laurels.
Amanda Krieg Thomas I feel very, very grateful to have had the trajectory I have had, so it's been a busy time. It feels like it's not that long, but when I think back, we were burning CDs and I had to mail mix CDs to sets across the country via UPS on my phone. I had to learn that UPS didn't deliver on Saturdays in 2008! That was all part of it. It really wasn't that long ago, but it feels like 100 years.
James Kennedy Yeah, it's not that long ago at all, man. Just look at how much the terrain has changed in that time. Streaming is the deal now, but that didn't exist back then.
Amanda Krieg Thomas No, streaming was not a thing. It was all DVDs.
James Kennedy Right. But I'm assuming that the advent of Netflix and Amazon must make it a safe job for you guys because there's so much content coming out now, with so many different streaming platforms creating their own content. I would have thought that you guys would be pretty safe for work for the foreseeable future. In an industry that is very uncertain in a lot of ways, this is one area that is probably safe for a while. Do you think that's safe to say?
Amanda Krieg Thomas Gosh, it's hard to say right now because no area of the music industry is completely safe. All of those big companies saw big booms, especially around 2021 and 2022. Prior to Netflix, Amazon, and the streamers, there used to be pilot seasons, and summers would be slower. Once those really took off and content took off, everyone was busy year-round, which is great in many ways—though less great in that vacations are nice sometimes.
Now some of those companies are slowing down a little bit. Netflix is a great example. There was a really big boom, and following the strikes, it feels like more of a rebuilding era for all of those companies. There is still going to be a lot of content because there are so many streamers and people always want content, but it feels like it is changing. Netflix in particular was outputting so much, and then they started canceling shows after one season.
That's the trick about being freelance, especially in TV: it's great to work on a season, but what if it gets canceled? Two years ago I was so busy, but I realized all the projects were limited series. Once you finish ten episodes, that's it, and you have to go find the next thing.
I don't mean to be doom and gloom—Netflix and all those big streamers are still making things, and there's still content to be made. But in the wake of the strikes, there is a sense in the air that things are changing a bit regarding what content will look like going forward.
James Kennedy Yeah, that's interesting. To a naive onlooker from the outside, it feels like we're living through the boom times right now for movies and TV shows because of streaming. But you're right, it's a pain in the ass when you get hooked on a TV show and after the first season it never comes back, leaving the whole thing hanging in the air. That must be so frustrating for the viewer, but also for all of the talent involved—like yourself, the scriptwriters, the actors, and the production team—to get halfway through a show and then have it aborted.
Amanda Krieg Thomas It's very true. It is a bummer when those things happen. There was a lot of press last year about Warner Brothers shooting movies and then never putting them out, or shows being put on streaming and then taken off. All these creative people work super hard to put out a season of television and put their all into creating something great, and then it gets cancelled.
I don't pretend to understand the higher-up power structures of all these studios, but it is undoubtedly a bummer to see great work not get an audience when we have all these streamers. You think, "Put it on streaming," but there are tax things and complicated corporate things involved. As an artist, it's hard to watch for sure.
James Kennedy What are your thoughts on the music industry more generally? I'm seeing a lot more parallels here than I thought. There have been seismic shifts in the business over the last 20 years—some good, some bad. For the most part, I've been an ambassador for the new model. As an independent artist myself, it's given me and many others the freedom to make our own music with or without a deal. We can keep moving and put it out there, which is empowering and great for art and musicians.
The problem is there's so much stuff now. How the hell do you get heard above the noise? And also, there's a big issue with remuneration: how do artists get paid fairly for their work now that everything is digitized and streamable? What are your thoughts from your vantage point?
Amanda Krieg Thomas Gosh, it is really hard because all of that is true. There is a lot of noise and a lot of music out there. Sync is a great avenue for music to get heard, especially for unsigned artists who don't have major label support making them a priority.
It's been really interesting to watch the recent rise of vinyl and people getting interested again in the album as an art form. From my vantage point, it's hard not to feel overwhelmed by the sheer amount of music and access that people have.
I sit in an interesting vantage point between artists and music, and filmmakers who are often casual listeners or passionate music fans who happen to be directing a movie. The valuation of art and ensuring artists are paid what they're worth is in a really scary time.
I won't presume to know a ton about AI beyond the fact that my husband is a TV writer, and that was a huge part of the Writers strike last year. While there are a lot of great things AI can do, the scariest part is how it impacts artists—whether they're musicians, painters, or writers. It's coming into a world that over the past few years has been primed not to value the thing itself, viewing it as just an MP3 or a digital download that's easy and inexpensive. What casual listeners don't see is that an MP3 is the result of musicians, a recording studio, a producer, an engineer, and a mixer.
We sit in the middle of that and often fight battles where a director asks, "Why does this cost so much? No one's heard of this band." We tell them, "That doesn't matter. This track still cost money to make, and we should pay them something fair, not nothing."
It's hard to know where it's going, and I don't feel educated enough to make guesses on the direction, but it is a scary thing. I think a lot about how we continue to value art the way it should be valued. AI is not making it easier. How do we protect the arts? I don't have the answer to that, but it's definitely top of mind. Let me know when you find the answer!
James Kennedy It's fascinating hearing your insight from your side of it. As you say, there aren't really any answers yet because everything advances by the minute. As soon as you've learned one thing, it changes again.
Change is on the horizon, and you're right to bring up AI. We still don't know what form it's going to take, but it's clearly going to be a main driver of the future. For someone who is generally a cynical, nihilistic, miserable bastard myself—
Amanda Krieg Thomas You don't sound nihilistic at all! You sound very optimistic, or at least very thoughtful. I feel like I'm over here being the fatalist saying, "Content is dying, AI is devaluing art, let's battle for the souls of artists!" In comparison, you sound positively optimistic.
James Kennedy I think it's probably just because I finished writing my second book and handed it to the publisher a few months ago. I wrote a 50-page chapter where I just ranted about AI, so I feel a bit more relaxed now that I've got it out of my system.
Going through that process helped me process it, in the sense that I ultimately have faith in people's love of music. Nothing can stop that. There's always going to be music, and we'll always find new ways. Even during the lockdown when we couldn't physically perform and musicians lost their main revenue stream, we found other ways like live streaming to keep making it happen. It's like a life source—we need to play it and people need to hear it. There are scary challenges on the horizon, but I think music will probably prevail in some form.
Amanda Krieg Thomas I do too. Art will prevail. There are things that people need to do and things that people need to consume. Art will prevail in some way—maybe live music will have a new resurgence, because technology can only go so far in creating an experience.
Having been in the music industry for a long time, it's always been interesting to me how many people want to be in the arts. I wonder how sustainable that is long term for people to have a viable living—to buy a house and have kids. People will make lives out of it, but how many people?
I think about it a lot in my field, watching the entertainment industry go through this contracting phase, hoping it moves to an expansion period. I have kids, a house, and a husband, and I can't live the way I lived at age 24, spending all my time hustling. I hope art can remain a viable living for as many people as possible.
James Kennedy 100%, that's a great point. There's a whole conversation here that could make another episode of the podcast, because I share all of your thoughts. As a working artist myself, I think about those things all the time. You think, "Man, how much longer can I keep doing this?"
Moving away from the scary stuff: speaking of writing books, you're also a published author yourself! You wrote the brilliant Thinking in Sync, which is available on Amazon and covers a ton of really useful stuff for artists and content creators interested in your side of the industry. It's a brilliant book, and I will put the link in the show notes so people can check it out. How did you find the process of writing it?
Amanda Krieg Thomas I put it out in 2019, right before my first child was born, having started it a few years prior. So many people are interested in sync and pitching music, and my peers and I see the same mistakes over and over—whether it's people trying to get noticed, forgetting about instrumentals, or not including metadata. With such an influx, you start seeing the same mistakes repeatedly and you just don't have time to respond to everyone.
Writing it was cathartic because it allowed me to address all the things we get asked on panels or see in our inboxes—things like, "Who are you? Is this a finished song or a demo?" It was my way of writing out all the things that frustrate me on a day-to-day basis and positioning them so it was actually helpful.
James Kennedy So I hope you guys take heed. You've got it direct from the source as to what a music supervisor needs and what they definitely don't. Stop mindlessly spamming them. Do your research, get your metadata in order, and appreciate that being organized and understanding how this side of the industry works is just as important as how much your song kicks ass.
Amanda Krieg Thomas Yeah, have great music, of course! But I get so many emails where it feels like people don't understand how much music we receive. The emails are very conversational, saying, "Hey, I'm this person, what are you looking for right now?" And I'm thinking, "I don't know who you are, and I don't have time to respond to you." So have your great music and send it properly.
To go back to the point about finding a great sync company: some supervisors, especially at studios, cannot accept unsolicited stuff and are very wary about it. The best way is to try to go after a sync company—I cannot recommend that enough. Finding who is a trusted resource for supervisors is a much worthier use of your time than spamming music supervisors.
As an artist, you should be making awesome music because that's what you're called to do. Use your time wisely, and sending cold emails to music supervisors is not a wise use of time. Focus on sync companies. You have too much art to make to waste time, so be smart about it.
James Kennedy Love it, love it! That's going to be the clip I use for the promo.
Amanda Krieg Thomas Yeah, I felt like I was onto something there!
James Kennedy Man, you are on a roll, I'm loving it! "Every sync is a snowflake," dropping all these truth bombs—it's brilliant. I could listen to it all day.
Amanda Krieg Thomas I try not to be a downer, but also helpful.
James Kennedy Well, you're making up for all the miserable stuff you were getting towards earlier with AI.
Amanda Krieg Thomas Thank you, good! I'm glad to hear that, James.
James Kennedy Balance, a good bit of balance. Before I let you go in the next minute, what's next for you? What have you got coming up, what are you working on, and are you allowed to say?
Amanda Krieg Thomas I think so. We have a really great slate of things coming up. We work a lot with Ryan Murphy Television, who I've been very fortunate to work with for the past five or six years. Right now we have American Horror Story airing, and coming up are the remaining episodes of American Horror Stories.
We are working on a new sports anthology series for FX called American Sports Story: Gladiator, about Aaron Hernandez. We're working on the new season of Monster—Dahmer: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story was the first one for Netflix, and the new season is going to be about the Menendez brothers.
We have 9-1-1 airing on ABC, and 9-1-1: Lone Star starting to air in the next couple of months. And I can't forget Big Mouth—we're working on the last season now. It won't come out until next year, but it's really incredible. There's a lot going on. A lot of stuff won't come out until later in the year, but we are in the thick of it now.
James Kennedy In that case, I think that's a perfect place for me to bow out and let you get on with your super busy schedule and your important work doing what you do best.
Amanda, thank you so, so much for taking time out to speak with us today. This has been really interesting, insightful, and informative. I know that all the musicians listening to this are going to be really grateful for you being so generous with your insights into how your side of the industry works. We all appreciate you, so thanks again for stopping by and best wishes with everything you've got coming up. Long may you continue to prosper and thrive.
Amanda Krieg Thomas Thank you so much, I really appreciate you having me, James. It was great talking. I always want to help artists understand what we do a little more so we can help them have great careers as well. Great chatting, and hope to talk to you soon.
Key Points:
The episode focuses on music sync, the synchronization of music with visual media, which is described as the holy grail for many artists.
Guest Amanda Krieg-Thomas, an Emmy-nominated music supervisor and author of Thinking in Sync, explains that music supervision covers pitching songs, clearing rights, planning on-camera performances, and liaising with composers.
She says the job involves far more emails, paperwork, research, and budget management than most people assume.
She notes that creative searches often require considering whether a song will clear, especially for scenes involving drugs, violence, or other sensitive content.
She explains that music supervisors serve the showrunner's vision and are rarely the final decision-makers on which songs are chosen.
She describes sync as a potential meritocracy for unsigned artists when a team is open, though recognizable artists are sometimes specifically requested.
She discusses industry changes including streaming, the rise of sync companies, the 2023 strikes, reduced content production, and concerns about AI devaluing artists' work.
Summary:
The episode focuses on music sync, the use of music alongside moving pictures in films, TV shows, adverts, and games.
The guest is Amanda Krieg-Thomas, an Emmy-nominated music supervisor and author of Thinking in Sync. She explains that music supervision involves pitching songs, clearing rights, handling paperwork, planning on-camera performances, and working with composers. She notes the job is mostly emails, research, and budget management rather than simply listening to music.
She discusses how creative searches must consider whether songs will clear, especially for sensitive scenes, and explains that supervisors serve the showrunner's vision and are rarely the final decision-makers. She describes sync as a potential meritocracy for unsigned artists when teams are open, though recognizable artists are sometimes requested. Finally, she discusses industry changes including streaming, sync companies, the 2023 strikes, reduced content, and AI's threat to artists' value.
The James Kennedy Podcast is a Society and Culture podcast hosted by musician and author, James Kennedy. Exploring the big questions around health, social issues, the arts, politics, mental health, the human condition and how to navigate this thing called life through casual conversations with scientists, activists, rock stars, philosophers and academics. Please subscribe, leave a rating and support the show.
