The Interscope studio complex felt smaller than I remembered it being in 2015—or rather, than it would be in 2015. I sat behind a mixing console that still used skeuomorphic digital displays instead of the holographic interfaces that wouldn't exist for another fifteen years, watching three of the industry's top producers argue about a sound they couldn't quite understand.
"The processing chain is impossible," Trevor, a veteran producer whose work I'd studied (would study?) in music school, insisted. "You can't get that texture from current hardware. I've tried every piece of equipment in this building."
*Because the plugin that creates it won't be written until 2012*, I thought, adjusting a frequency band that shouldn't technically have been manipulatable yet. Out loud, I said, "Sometimes you have to think beyond current limitations."
The track playing through the monitors was the one I'd shown Jimmy—a reimagining of a song that, in my previous timeline, hadn't been produced until 2019. Now, its futuristic soundscape filled the room like prophecy, making the platinum records on the walls feel like artifacts from a past I was rapidly erasing.
*Caught between the rhythm of yesterday
And the beat of what's to come
Every melody finds its way
To where we started from
But baby, in this space between
The future and the now
Nothing's ever what it seems
Time won't tell us how*
My BlackBerry buzzed—still strange to see text messages appear in such primitive format. It was Beyoncé:
"The forums are exploding. Everyone's trying to figure out how we did it. You're starting a revolution earlier than planned, aren't you?"
I smiled at her choice of words. If she only knew how much earlier. Before I could respond, the studio door opened and Jimmy walked in, followed by Rico and two executives I recognized from future board meetings that might never happen now.
"Marcus," Jimmy said, that familiar intensity burning in his eyes, "play them the bridge section again. The part with the spatial effect."
I obliged, bringing up the segment that showcased production techniques that were, technically speaking, impossible in 2005. The executives leaned forward, their expressions a mix of confusion and awe. One of them—Roberts, I remembered, future head of A&R—shook his head slowly.
"It's like hearing music from another time," he said.
*If you only knew*, I thought, watching the waveforms dance across screens that seemed archaic to my future-trained eyes. The irony of my situation never quite faded—sitting here, teaching industry veterans techniques I'd learned from their future selves, creating sounds that wouldn't exist for years using jerry-rigged versions of technology that hadn't been invented yet.
"The blogs are calling it 'post-future production,'" Rico said, scrolling through his BlackBerry. "They're saying it's going to change everything."
"It already has," Jimmy replied, fixing me with that penetrating stare that had launched a thousand careers across two decades I'd already lived through. "The question is, what else are you sitting on, Marcus?"
I met his gaze, thinking of the hundreds of production techniques, the countless innovations, the entire evolution of music technology that lived in my memory like a library from tomorrow. "Let's just say I'm just getting started."
Trevor snorted softly. "Kid, you can't just rewrite the rules of production overnight."
But that's exactly what I was doing—had done—would do again. Only this time, a decade earlier than before. Through the studio windows, I could see the Los Angeles afternoon traffic crawling along Sunset, each car carrying someone toward a future that was rapidly rewriting itself around the sounds pouring from our monitors.
Jimmy's phone rang—an antique ringtone that brought back memories of my first life's early career. "That's Jimmy Jam," he said after checking the display. "Third time today. Everybody wants to know how we're doing it."
I turned back to the console, hiding my smile. In my previous timeline, Jimmy Jam had been one of my mentors. Now, in this rewritten present, he was trying to decode techniques I'd learned from his future self. The circular nature of time had never felt more dizzying.
The track continued to play, its impossible sounds filling the room like visitors from a future that now might never exist. But maybe that was the point—to take everything I'd learned in twenty years of industry evolution and compress it into a singular moment of revolution.
After all, some futures were worth sacrificing to build better ones.
Even if you had to rebuild them from memory.