Though Birth is the debut solo album from the London-based composer, producer, and DJ Madison Willing, the artist already has an impressive body of work under her belt. As a composer, she was part of the team that worked on ten episodes of the fifth season of The Crown. She has collaborated with the legendary drum & bass producer dBridge on an EP of genre-exploding music. As a DJ, she displays an understanding of dance music that is somewhat atypical for a composer with formal training. Clearly, the artist is someone who is adept at moving through worlds and styles. We had a chat with her about all this and more; read the interview and listen to Birth, which is out now on dBridge’s Exit Records, below.

Birth is your debut LP. Are there things you feel like you are able to express in your solo work that you aren’t able to express when scoring for film and television?

Madison Willing: I have found that the methods of expression are always the same whether I’m producing a track for a record or a cue for a film score. The difference for me has been narrative. Rather than writing from the perspective of a character, I am trying to be confessional.

What was the process like making this record?

An imagined landscape, barren and dystopian, while fighting inner demons. That was my internal vision. I initially sought to be vulnerable with my darkest anxieties and create a body of work that felt incredibly personal. For some reason the pieces came out clean and orchestrated, and I enjoyed making the dark sound beautiful.

Like any project, it took some time to develop the overall instrumentation and musical language, but when I finally found it, the album was finished over the course of a few weeks. I think that’s why they feel personal to me, because I refused to finesse and overthink. They are meant to be sketches of honesty.

Exit is known more as a drum & bass label, and you have collaborated with dBridge in the past. You also DJ. What is your relationship with dance music? What made you feel like Exit was the right fit for this release?

I feel a particular sentiment when listening to a cinematic dance music record and being immersed by a film soundtrack. There’s a deep world-building that happens when developing the musical language for a score and I feel similarly about my favorite albums, from Burial’s Untrue to Aphex Twin to Kode9 to dBridge.

Exit is one of the most significant labels in the UK for drum & bass and bass music, while pushing boundaries with more experimental releases. The earliest Exit albums could be soundtracks to sci-fi thrillers including The Binary Collective, a collaboration between Consequence, Joe Seven, and dBridge, who built a soundscape record around a movie concept they invented. 

I felt that Birth came from the undergrowth, the deepest, darkest tension and release, while being vulnerable and pure. I was lucky that dBridge felt connected to the record, and I like to think that it’s a bold risk to put out a modern classical album, but he has been releasing minimal and cinematic ambient music like his drone LP ME since the label’s creation.

There’s also a remix package that comes along with Birth. How did that come about? Are you happy with how it turned out?

A dream come true. While I was writing Birth, I imagined each track to have its own story, like a collection of scenes. It was mesmerising to hear these re-told through different perspectives, from other voices. Each producer has a very special personal signature, so it felt like I could hear the personalities of the narrator and how they felt during its reinvention. COIDO, Ehua, Synkro, Sinistarr, and Itoa all offer different insights to a shared experience.

What skills from your work as a DJ do you apply to your work as a composer—and vice versa?

A certain freedom in choice. Sometimes death metal is more effective in telling the story than a string quartet. For me, DJing exercises bravery in decision making, and forces me to look for new and unexpected sounds. Sometimes the initial brief for a film needs to be thrown out of the window. Sometimes a mix needs to tell a story. They both meet in the middle of expression and inspiration.

Is there a thing you like to do when you get stuck while working on music? A reset strategy? 

Go outside. 

What was your entryway into composing for film and television?

Scoring anything I could. The student plays at university, the extra short films at film school. Assisting on television shows like The Crown helped me become more confident while I developed my own sound, as I learned how to approach, interact and communicate with directors. I truly feel that there is no “right” way to enter the industry, it’s a consistent drive to create meaningful work and respond empathetically to every single scene. It never feels demanding when the team is supportive and the story feels important.

Are there any composers or artists you have been listening to a lot lately?

I recently watched the sci-fi fantasy show Silo and Atli Örvansson’s score is an embodiment of pitch bending string arrangements and eerie drones recorded underground within a real concrete silo. I also love Aya’s album im hole.