Texan Mosaic

by NICOLE TRUGILLO//Editor-in-Chief

We all have something that inspires us.

Whether it’s a person or a place, it helps inspire in ways that can’t be described.

Tyler Sederwall, a YouTuber who creates video games and music for others, says that he was inspired by other YouTubers as well.

He explains that the people who he watched as a teenager inspired and helped him forget about the bad things in life. So, he decided to be a YouTuber and make a job out of it.

“I like to try to help entertain people,” Sederwall told the Plainsman Press in a recent interview. “I was into videos, so I thought why not get an early start and try to make people happy and exercise my video skills at the same time.”

Sederwall is a full-time college student in Missouri, where he is pursuing a film major and plans to go into television production.

“I think I’ve been making videos for about five or six years now,” says Sederwall. “I mostly make video game-related videos, whether they are video game races that we like to call Versus, or Let’s Plays, where I play through games and try to commentate and try to be funny. Try is the key word here.”

Sederwall, along with Josh Jepson, a friend of Sederwall and another YouTuber, have a YouTube channel named Versus. They each pick a game and race through it to see who wins. Sederwall also has separate YouTube channels named “Tyler Sederwall” and “AttackingTucans.” The channel “Tyler Sederwall” features videos that Sederwall develops for popular Let’s Play games, while his other channel has videos that he makes just for himself.

“I like to make a bunch of different types of videos, whether they are blog-styled or talking to the camera,” Sederwall explains. “Sometimes I do get frustrated trying to find new ideas for videos. Sometimes, when you’re in a bad mood, the last thing you want to do is try to be funny and being upbeat. But I kind of push through it and try to be silly anyway.”

Sederwall recently released his second album, “Game Face,” which incorporates video games in the songs that he created. His influence for making music started when he was in high school, where he would listen to music which helped through hard times.

“The music improved my mood, and it made me happy and made me forget about the bad things in the world,” explains Sederwall. “I just wanted to try to do it and see what it’s like. I don’t think I’m the best at it. But I think it’s a fun hobby to use to create a freedom for myself and challenge myself in ways I wouldn’t with making videos.”

Sederwalls says that before “Game Face” there wasn’t a lot of pop video game-related music that he liked. He wanted to create an album that followed his kind of genre.

“I wanted to listen to that type of music,” explains Sederwall. “So, since it didn’t exist, I decided to make it and at least have it for myself more than anything.”

The creative process for Sederwall starts off with him listening to hundreds of beats that he wants to go along with the style of music he wants to create.

“I purchase those beats, and then I spend hours coming up with melodies to go along with those beats and the lyrics for those melodies,” explains Sederwall. “Then I go through the recording process.”

Sederwall uses a type of software application called Garageband to put his music together. But, eventually he wants to push out of his comfort zone and use more advanced music creation tools.

“The music recording I use now is about eight or nine years out of date,” says Sederwall. “So, I want to get up with the times on that. I record the lyrics and kind of just spend a lot of time to perfect it and make sounds that I think work well together.”

“Game Face” includes 14 tracks (not including the bonus tracks), most of which incorporate video games.

“The first song on the album is “Taking Charge,” and that song is about pushing yourself out of your comfort zone,” explains Sederwall. “Even though things are hard sometimes, you feel like giving up, to continue trying because I think that everyone thinks they’re not good enough. I think we’re our own worst enemy when it comes to that. It was kind of a motivational track for me to finish the album.”

The next track is named “Gamer Revolution,” which, according to Sederwall, was the braggy song of the album that many rappers use on their albums.

“I mean I can’t brag about having Ferraris and that kind of stuff,” says Sederwall with a laugh. “But I think it’s every teenager’s dream to make money by playing videos games. Teenager Tyler would never have thought it would happen to him in the future.”

“Do It Our Way” is the third track, and Sederwall says that it’s not video game-related. But he wanted to include a party song based on a Kesha theme.

The next song is “Chasing Happiness,” which has emotional ties that Sederwall included in the lyrics.

“I was going through a sad time when it came to somebody that I liked, and financially,” says Sederwall. “I made a song about how we’re kind of in a fish bowl trying to find something that makes us happy, and we try to find different things in our lives to try to bring ourselves up, just trying to find something that makes us happy.”

“Pokégod ” is a song based on the game Pokémon. It’s about being the best poké master.

“It’s mostly a fiction song, because I suck at Pokémon,” Sederwall says jokingly. “I think it’s the new version of I want to be the very best like no one ever was. Taking that song and giving it a 2016 spin to it. It has a more pop feel to it.”

The next track is “Get Bananas,” featuring the video game character, Donkey Kong. According to Sederwall, he took some inspiration from the original Donkey Kong rap and put a new 2016 feel to it. He added dubstep to the song and fun rap lyrics.

The seventh song on the track is “Old School,” with lyrics Sederwall wrote based on old-school video games from childhood. He says that he did grow up with old-school games, but not the same way someone who was born 10 years before him.

“It’s kind of about how old-school games were difficult,” explains Sederwall. “Even though they were more simplistic, you would play them over and over again, because they were just so much fun. There’s lyrics in the song that say even though they’re about 30 years old, they are still fine games. Games now won’t hold up 30 years from now, when some of the old-school games are still fun. It’s kind of like the oldies.”

The next song is “This is War,” which, according to Sederwall, is about the video game “Super Smash Bros.” This song was part of the three singles he released before the album.

“Release the Beast” doesn’t have too much meaning to it, according to Sederwall. He says he heard the beat and it made him feel like a beast. So he thought he would try to make that song sound over the top and vicious.

“This is probably my favorite song on the album,” says Sederwall. “This was the first song that I started working for the album, and it’s the second to last song I finished.  It was the most difficult to make. It was a song that I went back to like every month for a couple of hours. The vocals were really out of my range, and it took a lot of practice to try to record them. Another thing I was trying to do with that song is have each part of the song different, not having any repeating elements whatsoever, and I ended up doing that.”

The next song is “Still See the Sunshine,” with a storyline about the video game “Super Mario Sunshine.” Sederwall says that it’s a rap song with more of a rock feel.

“I tried to do screamo vocals to the best of my abilities,” says Sederwall. “I’m not very much of a screamo person, but it fit more into the song, so I tried to do it.”

“One I Love” is a love song, but, according to Sederwall, it’s not a traditional love song. He wrote the song when he was in love with someone, putting his personal feelings into it.

“Smash It Up” was the first song he released from the album, and it’s the type of song that amps you up, according to Sederwall.

“I’m Ratchet” is a rap song about the video game “Ratchet and Clank.” Sederwall explains that it was a pun he wanted to make, because on his other YouTube channel, Versus, He likes to say a lot of jokes about the word ratchet.

“My friend Josh hates me saying new phrases,” Sederwall says with a laugh. “The song doesn’t make a lot of sense if you don’t know about the game, because it’s not just about being ratchet.”

The last song is named “Game Face (Outro).” Sederwall explains the song is about thanking everyone who supported him financially, and it gave him the will to finish the album.

Sederwall says that he has gotten positive feedback on the album, having received hundreds of tweets and comments on websites.

“Fortunately, it’s due to the fact it reached the audience I catered it for,” explains Sederwall. “The only bad comment I’ve gotten is when someone said this wasn’t the music for me. I can see where people like it.”

Sederwall says he has put in hundreds of hours into the album, recording each song about four times.

“Like I said before, I’m not a great singer,” says Sederwall. “But I had to go over it again and again and try to hit the vocals. I’m no Adele or anything. I don’t have the pipes. I just like writing songs, and it was fun.”

Sederwall says that his future plans are to keep promoting this album for the next few months. He plans to make a lot of videos for each song on the album, whether it’s lyrics or silly videos.

“Once I’m finished, I will do the same thing I did with “Party Right” (first album) and upload the whole finished album to YouTube for the people that can’t stream or afford to buy it,” says Sederwall. “Since I’ve squeezed everything out of it as much as I possibly can.”

Sederwall’s next person goal is to try and release an EP for the summer. He says that his EP won’t be video game-related, and he probably won’t release video game-related music in the future.

“If I do, I’ll probably release them as single songs,” says Sederwall. “Maybe when I make enough I’ll put them all on an album and release it.”

If anyone is interested in listening to the album, it can be found on iTunes. It also can be streamed on Soundcloud and Spotify.