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FINNEAS in Focus
The Grammy-winning producer on crafting cinematic soundscapes, learning from his sister Billie Eilish, and staying true to himself on new LP, For Cryin' Out Loud!
- Published on
by Ben Boddez
Photos by Olof Grind | Cover Design by Alex Kidd
In talking to Finneas O’Connell, you immediately understand why he’s such an accomplished producer and songwriter. Mostly reserved, save for the odd colourful turn of phrase, it’s clear he’s been in the music business long enough to know exactly what he likes. Over the course of his short but fruitful career, he’s proven to be the kind of artist who can cut distractions and simply lock himself in the studio for hours, until he emerges on the other side with a product he’s proud of.
Best known as the producer and co-writer behind his megastar sister, Billie Eilish, FINNEAS has been remarkably busy ever since a set of tracks he produced in his bedroom, which became Eilish’s breakout album When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go, helped the sibling duo become only the third act to sweep the Big Four awards (Record, Song and Album of the Year, as well as Best New Artist) at the Grammys in 2019. At the time, O’Connell was only 22.
Not only has he released three projects of his own and continued to stay by Eilish’s side – in fact, she’s still never worked with any other producer or songwriter – but he’s also been recruited into the studio by a galaxy of musical superstars including Selena Gomez, Justin Bieber, Camila Cabello and Tate McRae, picked up two Oscars along the way, crafted a song for a Pixar animated boy band in Turning Red, and scored films and television shows (his latest being visionary director Alfonso Cuaron’s TV series Disclaimer). To the delight of many who first saw him as an actor on Glee, he’s even picked that mantle back up – he’s set to appear in the upcoming series Laid, starring alongside Stephanie Hsu.
Although FINNEAS wears many hats, he says that he’d call himself a songwriter first and foremost if anyone were to ask – but he partially credits his background in the field of acting for why it comes so easily to him. In working with so many A-listers with outsized personalities, he likens helping them write a song and getting into their head to playing a character.
It’s something that he says he even applies to his own music, when he has to tap back into the emotions that inspired his tunes at his live shows. Plus, as someone who prides himself on knowing which buttons to push to get audiences to feel deeply, those emotions might have been slightly exaggerated for dramatic effect in the first place. In discussing his sophomore album, For Cryin’ Out Loud!, it almost seems like he feels that there’s not much he can add to a formal interview – instead, he’d prefer to be seen more like a vessel to deliver something the audience can explain in their own way.
“Honestly, I stopped trying to describe what goes into it,” he says. “Somebody would say ‘What does that line mean?’ and I’d say ‘Well, it means this,’ and they’d look disappointed and say ‘Oh – well to me it means this.’ And I’m like ‘I like your meaning more than I like mine, so let’s just call that the right meaning.’”
FINNEAS has often expressed pride at being able to pick up so many accolades while working without studio-assembled teams of musicians, turning the creations made in a childhood bedroom with only the help of the one from the room down the hall into worldwide phenomena. As he’s ventured into the industry and met like-minded friends, however, he’s a lot more open to exploring the powers of collaboration. He credits albums like Feist’s The Reminder and Bon Iver’s 22, A Million for featuring large teams behind the boards, but still ending up sounding like the artist’s singular vision.
“I had finished making Billie’s last album, and I wanted to make another solo album, and I felt like the last time I went to make a solo album I had a lonely time doing it,” he says. “It was just in a room, alone, playing every instrument and singing everything by myself. I’m proud of that album, but it was a lonely process. So I called a bunch of my really close friends and we did 14 days in a studio together.”
Possibly due to his recent work in film and television, FINNEAS’ production on both his own sophomore album and Eilish’s latest, HIT ME HARD AND SOFT, feels like it’s become a lot more cinematic, often adorned with strings while creating warm, enveloping musical worlds. Another compelling aspect both albums share is longer, four or five-minute tracks that eschew traditional song structure and shift through a couple phases, feeling like they never finish the way they start.
For someone who’s already essentially got it all, one might say that it feels like he’s arriving at a stage in his career where he’s now creating whatever feels natural without much regard for the reception. Actually, however, he’ll tell you that it’s more because he’s built up a level of trust with his audience that they understand who he and his sister are as artists, and has also developed a better understanding of what they’ll gravitate towards.
“We’re very grateful, but I think we never in the first place made music hoping that we could get awards, if that makes sense. That’s not on our goal list, and it never really was,” he says. “Our goal list is to be creative and make music that is inspiring to us. We really care about our audience and we want people who buy a ticket to like what we’re putting out, so it’s still important to us, but I think we try not to get too caught up in ‘Are we going to make the most popular piece of music?’ I’m continually impressed with how smart audience members are.”
Valued just as highly to him as the reaction of the audience, however, is the reaction of the sibling that he’s consistently called his best friend since day one. When asked about things that he’s learned in the time creating with her, FINNEAS got a little overwhelmed.
“She’s been the person that I’ve worked with the most in my whole life, spent the most hours with, and it’s been a really beautiful, profound experience,” he says. “I can’t even point to any specific things, because I feel like so much of my entire creative life has been with her. She’s been very kind and generous about this album, which I’m very grateful for. Her opinion means so much to me, so the fact that she likes it is really meaningful.”
Some of FINNEAS’ first forays into the creative field, however, actually came from a different familial connection – his mother, Maggie Baird. She’s primarily known as an actress appearing on shows like Bones, Six Feet Under and The X-Files, but she also recorded two albums. He recounts being inspired by her songwriting at a young age, fascinated by her poetic turns of phrase – even if he says the title of his latest work was possibly inspired by her outbursts.
“‘For cryin’ out loud’ is something that my parents said a lot growing up – I was probably the reason they were saying it often. It’s always been a phrase that I thought was charming and funny,” he says.
As for the lyric that FINNEAS feels proudest of on his latest, it appears on the track “Little Window,” a song that examines the relationship that we have with our phones, as they become a window to the rest of the world that fits in our pocket. The lyric featured a subdued, desensitized FINNEAS singing “Honey, what’s on your mind? Everything, all the time” in the lower parts of his vocal range.
“I think we’re in a period of time where we haven’t figured out what’s great about it and what’s terrible about it – we’re still in the soup,” he says. “We’re really exposing ourselves to a lot, all at once, and there are good things and bad things about it. I think it’s a little hard to be focused on one singular thing at this point in time.”
FINNEAS’ debut album was half-jokingly titled Optimist, and he’s often spoken about his struggles with staying positive about the direction the world is headed in. Although things have only seemed to get more and more unbelievable in the news cycle, however, FINNEAS has taken a little more time to notice the “incredible people doing incredible things all the time,” saying that “it’s a multifaceted thing – it’s not optimist or pessimist all the time, thankfully, but it varies.” It’s one of the reasons he felt it so necessary to throw his name in the celebrity endorsement ring for the upcoming U.S. election, appearing in a video alongside his sister to support Kamala Harris.
“I care about climate change policy, I care about gun control policy, I care about reproductive rights, I care about trans rights,” he says. “Those are all issues that are effectively on the ballot. We have one candidate saying they are passionate about those issues and want to address them, and one that doesn’t – so to me, just taking the candidates at face value, that’s the person that gets my vote.”
Since Vanity Fair’s “Same Interview, Different Year” series with FINNEAS’ sister – which ran from 2016-2022 and chronicled the rapid rise to fame of a teenager in the middle of simply trying to turn into an adult – was such an endlessly fascinating window into what it must feel like for an overnight success that only continued to get bigger and bigger, I had to ask FINNEAS what some of his biggest shifts might have been if he received the same questions. His response showed the determination and focus that’s seen his name consistently attached to some of the biggest pop culture moments of the past decade.
“This sounds so weird, but in some ways, very little,” he replied. “I’ve learned some things that I didn’t use to know, but I think the person I used to be would get along with the person I am today.”
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The Grammy-winning producer on crafting cinematic soundscapes, learning from his sister Billie Eilish, and staying true to himself on new LP, For Cryin' Out Loud!
