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"I keep shaping and manipulating the sound until it feels as close as possible to what I hear and feel in my mind" - Thunder Bae on her new album A WOMAN

An interview with Düsseldorf-based singer, songwriter and producer Thunder Bae, on her debut album ‘A WOMAN’.

By Eimear O SullivanMusicngear Editor

In the interview below, I sit down with Thunder Bae to discuss her debut album, which is a complex exploration of modern womanhood. We go through the production process, what synths and pads she used, the overall writing process, what other art influenced it, how co-mixing the songs worked, how being signed to Cleopatra Records came about, what the setup is like for performing these songs as part of a live show, books and films she recommends for readers who are interested in learning more about this subject, and more!

Listen to ‘A WOMAN’ here. 

Eimear O Sullivan, Musicngear: I love the synths and pads that run throughout 'A WOMAN' - could you tell us a bit about what you used? 

I used a mix of analog and digital gear throughout ‘A WOMAN’. The analog side included the Moog Grandmother, Moog Mavis, piano, guitars, bass, and cello played by Stanislaw, which I often resampled and transformed. Digitally, I also used the Novation MiniNova and its vocoder. My approach was mostly about trying to make the music sound the way it felt in my head.

Sometimes I would go out into a field and record textures, nature sounds, or even cows, haha, and then blend those recordings with something much heavier, like a Reese bass, to create contrast. Other times, I would run a bass through four distortion pedals just to see how far I could push it. I think we all carry a lot of contrasts inside us. I can feel like a thunderstorm, and at the same time I can also be very gentle and soft. Both can exist at the same time, and I wanted the production to reflect that.

I think it is somehow my calling to translate what I feel into a medium like music. So I keep shaping and manipulating the sound until it feels as close as possible to what I hear and feel in my mind. 

Musicngear: Could you describe the overall writing and production process for this album? 

The album was produced mostly in Ableton, although some of the bass and drum parts were originally created in Logic and later transferred into my Ableton sessions. 

My recording setup was honestly very IDGAF-coded. I recorded the majority of the album with a €300 Audio-Technica microphone and pre-mixed almost everything myself in my home studio. Most of the backing vocals and harmonies were recorded with a dynamic mic. Some of the cello recordings were also made in a very unpolished way. We recorded them with the Audio-Technica microphone on high gain in a living room and home studio in France.

I used a lot of software instruments and effects as well, including Serum, Diva, bitcrushers, and many other plug-ins, but the process was never really about using the most expensive or technically perfect equipment. It was more about capturing the right emotion and making whatever I had available work. 

Crystal Ball originally started in Logic before I moved it into Ableton. Before I had even created the full arrangement, I recorded a lot of operatic, siren-like backing vocals. Those voices became the foundation of the production and helped me understand what kind of world the song needed to exist in. I later manipulated and layered them throughout the track, especially in the outro and around the “I’d rather be part…” section. I am not very interested in following a technically correct process. I just keep adding, removing, distorting, and reshaping things until the song feels emotionally accurate. 

Musicngear: What other art were you consuming while making this album? 

There were a lot of different references shaping the emotional world of A WOMAN. Sofia Coppola's ‘The Virgin Suicides’, Jeanne d'Arc, The Addams Family, and David Lynch's ‘Mulholland Drive’ and ‘Blue Velvet’ were all somewhere in my mind. I was drawn to the beauty, darkness, strangeness, and tragedy within those worlds. 

What is happening to women in our world also influenced the album deeply, especially the stories of women who are unheard, silenced, or never given the space to speak for themselves. 

My own teenage years became a big reference too, because so many of the emotions on the album come from memories and things I was still trying to understand.

Musically, Bach influenced me a lot, as well as Lament by Invadable Harmony. I also made a playlist while creating the album and listened to it constantly. It became almost like an emotional map of the world I was trying to build. And so many other films, and works that I just don't have coming to my mind right now... 

Musicngear: I saw that you co-mixed this album with Maxxit, could you tell us a bit about your mixing process?

I met Maxxit many years ago, and we have been very close ever since. He is an incredibly skilled engineer and mixing engineer, so I spent a lot of time working with him in his studios, especially during the early stages of my career. We experimented a lot, tried different recording and production techniques, and even made covers of songs I loved so I could learn how they were built. Over time, he became both a mentor and one of my closest friends.

Our workflow for ‘A WOMAN’ was very straightforward. I wrote, produced, and recorded all of the music, and I also created rough mixes so the emotional direction of each song was already clear. 

Once the production felt finished, I sent Maxxit the stems, and we developed the final mixes together. We stayed in very close communication throughout the entire process. He would send me a version, I would give detailed feedback, and we would continue refining it until the song felt right. We worked through the album song by song and managed to finish everything in time.

The final mixing was done in Pro Tools. We used plug-ins such as Pro-Q 3, Soothe, Abbey Road TG, Neve 1073 emulations, UREI 1176 compressors, the H3000, and Valhalla effects. The technical side was important, but our main focus was always preserving the emotion, contrasts, and unusual textures that were already inside the productions. 

Musicngear: You have some shows coming up - could you talk a bit about what your setup for performing these songs live is like? 

I recently played a small run of shows in Los Angeles at places like the Viper Room, Bar Sinister, and Run Out Groove Records. 

For those shows, I performed solo, so I built the live setup around being able to move between more intimate and more powerful moments by myself. For the acoustic parts, I play Omnichord and sing. I also use a keyboard for the bass synth parts while performing vocals at the same time. Everything else runs through a fully automated and processed Ableton session, including the backing tracks, effects, transitions, and additional production elements. 

For my upcoming shows, I am planning to expand the setup into a duo or trio format with more synthesizers, Rhodes, and guitars. I might also play bass for some of the songs. I want the live show to keep evolving and to feel more physical and dynamic, while still preserving the detailed production and atmosphere of the album. 

Musicngear: How did signing to Cleopatra Records come about? 

A music industry contact (Sabine Fleischer A&R) introduced me to Cleopatra Records. They listened to my music, we started talking, and it quickly felt like the right home for the album. 

Musicngear: And finally, for anyone looking to explore this topic further, are there any books or films you would recommend? 

I would recommend ‘In Defense of Witches’ by Mona Chollet. What I love about the book is how it reclaims figures who have historically been feared, silenced, or marginalised, and uses them to reflect on the way women are still expected to behave today. It explores autonomy, independence, and the pressure to conform. It is incredibly powerful, and reading it made me realise so much about contemporary society. 

I would also recommend ‘The Second Sex’ by Simone de Beauvoir. It is obviously a very different kind of book, more philosophical and essayistic, but it still feels incredibly relevant to me. It helped me understand how femininity is shaped by social expectations rather than simply existing as something natural or fixed. 

In terms of films, ‘Persona’ by Ingmar Bergman is probably one of the most powerful explorations of identity, silence, and the boundaries between two women. The cinematography is also stunning. I would also recommend ‘The Virgin Suicides’, because it says so much about the way female pain can be romanticised, observed, and misunderstood by others. That film moves something very deep inside me.

None of these works offer a simple answer, which is exactly why I find them so interesting. They leave space for contradiction, discomfort, and interpretation, and that is also the space I wanted this album to exist in.

Connect with Thunder Bae
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Connect with Cleopatra Records
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About Eimear O Sullivan

Eimear Ann O Sullivan is a multi-genre music producer, audio engineer and vocalist. After receiving a Masters in Music Technology from the CIT Cork School of Music, she went on to operate as a producer under the name Blakkheart. Her releases have received critical acclaim from Ireland's biggest music publications, such as District Magazine and Nialler9, alongside receiving heavy commercial radio airplay. She currently works in Cork recording studio Flashpoint CC. Previous clients of hers include the likes of Comedy Central’s Dragony Aunt star Candy Warhol, rapper Darce and Outsider YP. (Photo credit @Fabian Boros)

Contact Eimear O Sullivan at eimear.o.sullivan@musicngear.com

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