Meet Louis Van Camp

We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Louis Van Camp. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Louis below.

Louis, thrilled to have you on the platform as I think our readers can really benefit from your insights and experiences. In particular, we’d love to hear about how you think about burnout, avoiding or overcoming burnout, etc.

I don’t mean this immodestly at all, but I think that I’m someone who has really learned how to produce a lot of stuff pretty efficiently for long stretches of time, and one of the most important reasons why is because I take breaks. I don’t work all day, every day, ever. At least not on one type of thing.

For me, giving myself a chance to breathe and reset is critical. It is crucial to the creative process. We don’t have endless reserves of mental energy, and when we “go go go” all the time, we aren’t giving our minds time to work on things passively which they actually do very well. If something is important it stays on your mind consciously or not and works on itself and integrates with other ideas and emotions and blossoms into something that you can’t create through endless battering.

A lot of the work I do is in my apartment, so it is important that every couple of hours I make sure to step out and get some air for at least twenty minutes. I hate working out but I force myself to do that too, especially when I’m working on a long project because my body needs the activity. I make sure to socialize even though I’m introverted because it forces me to stop thinking about my work and respond and react to real people in real time. More often than not, by the next day, especially after sleeping, I have all sorts of new ideas and fresh outlooks that I can incorporate into my work. My mind needs a chance to work on stuff without me telling it what to do all the time.

Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?

I am currently earning my Master’s in Arts in Sound Arts and Industries at Northwestern University. That’s a big deal for me for two reasons: one) I am the first person in my family to go to college, let alone higher ed, and two) I finally embraced the arts.

I didn’t grow up with any money, My parents were heavy drinkers. My mom died when I was in high school. College never seemed like a possibility. I felt trapped in my hometown. The only thing I thought I wanted to do for a career was play music. For years, I played around in bands but eventually decided this was no way to make a living, and abandoned it cold-turkey for a student-loan filled college expedition. I earned my Bachelors in Arts which was the first best decision of my life, got a job at Northwestern University in a neuroscience lab, applied to grad schools for psychology programs a few times, failed every time to get in, decided again that this was no way to make a living, and nervously applied to the Sound Arts program, which was the second best decision of my life.

Here, I can play to my strengths and my passions in a supportive learning environment. I’ve also learned that there are so many ways to get into the arts that aren’t your normal ‘record and release music for streams’ kind of thing. Since joining the program, I’ve composed and produced three original songs for an interpretive dance performance, ten upbeat electronic dance songs for a dance festival, two full scores for two short films, designed the sound and music for a 90-minute play, one full-length radio show, a live performance music video, and around a dozen themes for indie games. The best part is that all of this was done within 10 months or so. What this means to me is that I’m becoming more versatile as a recording artist and sound designer and that now there is a wider scope of possibilities that I can embark upon professionally.

In summary, what I’m focused on right now is growing as a musician and sound designer. My “brand” is still growing, but there hasn’t been anything in the audio world I’ve disliked doing yet. If I could pick one favorite though, it would be composing. I love writing music, particularly as aids to other forms of media.

Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?

1) Repetition is really important. Get the reps. Show up and do the work over and over again in the realest most authentic circumstances possible. If you think you can do something but you haven’t *actually* done it, it probably isn’t as easy as you think. One of the worst experiences I’ve had professionally was sitting in on a live performance that I was severely underprepared for because I baselessly thought to myself that I was “too good to need to practice.” Well it turns out I wasn’t, the music wasn’t as easy as it sounded, I played terribly, and I ended up embarrassing myself in front of a bunch of great musicians.

2) Prove it with action! If you say you are going to do something, you got to do it! Don’t flake out. Being trusted is the best thing you can have.

3) Lastly, and most importantly (to me) is humility. If you are humble, you will keep learning and growing. The smartest people I’ve ever met were all very modest, quiet, gentle, and humble because they were aware of how much they really didn’t know. Experts often don’t feel like experts. Experts can also identify an arrogant hack.

Is there a particular challenge you are currently facing?

Jealousy. That’s an easy one. I get jealous of other people. Jealous of their skills, talents, successes, looks, fame, professional achievements, songs, artwork, hair, bodies, charisma, money, education, partners, etc. All of it. I have close friends who are wonderfully supportive of me that I become intensely jealous over. I feel threatened all the time by other people’s success.

Overcoming this hasn’t been easy and it is probably going to be a lifelong challenge, but the first thing I have to say is that I have a therapist whom I trust who brings me back to reality. A big part of our work is remembering that my perceptions are not accurate depictions of reality: Me feeling threatened doesn’t mean there are actual threats.

The comparisons that I hold between myself and others is fundamentally meaningless. I’m a human being with a billion complexities, and people are going to like me or dislike me for their own billion reasons. There is nothing I can do to be “perfect” because perfection just does not exist–it can’t, it is impossible. But for some reason it still hurts and I still get scared and envious when I think other people are better than me.

What I’ve found though (when I tell my mind to shut up and think critically instead!) is that none of that stuff really matters. People don’t care if I’m “the best” musician versus a “good” musician, or if I’m the smartest or funniest or prettiest or whatever else it is my jealous brain tries to tell me. What they care about is how they feel when they’re around me, if I’m trustworthy, reliable, dependable, and kind. Those are the things that really matter, those are the things that really stand out to people. Not all that other junk.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.louisvancamp.com
• Instagram: L.Van.Champ
• Other: Apple Music, Spotify, Amazon, etc.; “Louis Van Camp.”