In this episode of the CultureRoad Podcast, DeEtta Jones and guest Zayd Portillo, Co-Founder of Light Energy Labs explore the profound transformations occurring in cultures across personal, organizational, community, and global levels. Zayd reflects on his own journey, crediting both luck and preparation for his success. The conversation delves into various themes, including the importance of nurturing creativity, harnessing technology in creative pursuits, and the democratization of artistic expression. They also discuss the unique challenges and exciting opportunities that artists and creators encounter in the digital age, including the utilization of AI and digital communities.

(00:44) fast and very kind of visible and kind of visceral to all of us how that transformation is happening and so this is a space to talk about some of that talk about the cultures that we exist in um and then also kind of where it is that we want to create a shared path where are some of the kind of cultural crossroads or the places where there's distinctiveness that we want to pursue together so that's a little bit about kind of why we're in this space and I think the distinctiveness is particularly acute this time because

(01:42) Keen to get everybody's name right but permission to be nervous right I uh I'm honored to be here right I'm excited to talk about the things that um you mentioned a lot of the things are like you said like not from the same world and so it's going to be super refreshing for me to talk about it and I'm excited to dig in so I'm ready okay so Zay Portillo tell us so we're going to talk about your career we're going to talk about all the cool things that you are working on right now and that you've

(02:49) needed to be prepared to do something like this and um I'm the kind of person that did not know what I was useful for and what these random things I was good at um how they all tied together and what you know it didn't make sense until time started to change and you know things started to change and I started realizing that you know being creative understanding technology you know um caring about you know people and things like that those things kind of put you in a unique place to affect a different kind of change and

(03:56) about yourself and I think that I I think is another just like it's it's one of those hidden things that you don't really um you're not really aware of but I I couldn't be who I who I am today and who I want to be tomorrow without for the people that I've met and um told me that I could I love it it sounds it sounds so interesting when you talk about it it makes me wonder like at what point in your life did you realize that you are a creative person and and the other the question that I have to

(04:58) Odyssey of the mind and it was like this program that was like you know an add-on it was like it was almost like an after-school thing but it's like you know this creative problem solving competitions worldwide people participate and you know do this solve these problems some of them are spontaneous some of them are short form long form and it's this big competition and my older brother was a part of it my mom was a judge in it once before and like you know the whole so it just it just became a thing that we did and this

(05:55) I had to it had to kind of nurture it early and so um it was something that that was that I would I was put in um and got familiar with early um so I would say I did have to nurture it but then it's still like you mentioned like you know okay well how do you make it employable right like it's not I don't know when I was a kid it was it was still like you know what are you gonna you know might give my guidance counselors hell to any of those boxes yo listen and you know and it would then I had to be like

(06:54) we're not alone like there's so many people who feel like that and I feel like that for like kids coming up because I remember when I was in college I interned with this group called creators camp and their whole mission it was really a volunteer thing but their whole mission was you know the kids of today are not are are going to be in jobs that um don't exist yet yeah so how do you prepare them for it yeah you know and like it was it was focused at um getting kids you know Hands-On into what's actually changing and you know

(07:51) is even possible and because I've been a benefactor of that stuff if I didn't know about Odyssey of the mind or if I didn't know about rap music you know what I mean for my older brother or whatever it is there's so many things that like people add into your life and you might not even know what's going on and and uh so I don't know being in the mix and like being you know touching a lot of things I think helped yeah yeah the likeliness that you might come out you know with stuff on your hands I love it it's like it's like

(08:56) cool tapestry yeah I love it it's so interesting and now now you have your hands in a bunch of really cool things you're doing um artist games I'm just learning about that like I literally right this moment I'm learning about artist games I'm learning about Timbo Island I'm learning Idol I'm learning about um even know about that one tell me tell me about some of the cool stuff so we talked about artist games a little bit beforehand but you know I have no idea what this is the concept of artist game

(09:59) you know what this game this is a game I mean a lot of the things that we would do um would be like you know reacting to People's music finding their music and you know um spotlighting them and doing all these things and so the idea of an artist game really came around just trying to make that fun and using Tech to to not make it just a you know a FaceTime call it's there's ways to you know have fun uh around it I I don't know if I spoke directly to it okay so let's say let's say if I am my 15 year old son the

(11:03) controller and um I had made this game where he had to drive around this island uh in Timberland and he would have to find people's music and when he finds it he would drive through it it would play the song and if he liked the song he would save it and fireworks would shoot out of the car and if he didn't like it it would shoot it out of the car and it would be exploded and you can nuka's car and the chat could engage night mode and all these things and it's all happening in real time and so the idea of an

(11:58) right like we can listen to music and listen watch podcasts all day but socializing creating playing that extra layer um you know it drives engagement it increases you know retention and it helps people like a Timberland you know uh gather an audience and engage with an audience one to one in a different way and so you know well it also sounds it like it may help with the like democratization of creativity as well like now creatives are creating music that they know might be featured in one of these and so it helps them even if

(13:04) one day we're getting ready for the next show and Busta Rhymes calls Tim and it's like yo yo take that off the market son that's off the market I need that record I need it right now and it actually I think I can't on Wednesday's gonna come out I can't say what it's going to come out but I heard it's coming I don't know when this podcast is a part of a project and that came from the show and there's more situations where you never know who's watching so yeah it would absolutely be

(14:03) right we can do it where when you gift a rose or let's say you gift a tomato um we can have it custom where Tomatoes get thrown all across the screen our own custom game animations and so it's super simple like on Tick Tock the gaming you know Tim City the Timberland like all these like you know uh symbolisms um these these things uh are have fun ways of being able to show up on on screen and so like you know a live show where somebody is where Timberland is reacting to someone's Talent OR skill

(15:06) picture with it is um you know the Indian entertainment industry artists have always monetized their IP their brand through engagement opportunities it's always been come to my by my album come to my concert um you know buy my merch um you know engage with me in this physical way and now today we have digital ways of doing the exact same thing and so it's really coloring in well how does that look what are different ways of you know and and designing for it and so it's designing ways to say well here's how you can

(16:06) we're similar generationally speaking and he started off his career doing something very differently like doing what he does very differently and so now he's had to really transition into a very different way of being in relationship with you know his audiences right how did how what are some of the ways in which that happened like of course as artists as creators you're constantly kind of paying attention to I think creative people are really good at it but a lot of the people who you know I interact

(17:03) well it's the lessons really come from the observations the observations are you know Timbaland came around in a time you know I hate to call it Legacy because like you know he's a legend but it's a legacy like media environment where you know you have Rec you know it was very it was a very um you made it through a very small window and the people who were put in that window got a lot of visibility and today you can't it's just not it's just not the same so there's that observation and

(18:01) well with in that reality he's like well look I have to um I think skynet's calling me sorry Nelnet oh that is um um we're not going back outside we're not going back outside and uh and so he was uh he a lot of these ideas really came about um trying to Express himself in a new way yeah he was like look we have all this technology we have these cameras he was not comfortable with being on a camera he was comfortable being on a stage he was comfortable being in front of people surprisingly he's comfortable

(19:12) also like stretch like to have somebody who has been incredibly successful like you said a Legend um have to say okay there's yet something else in front of me that I have to learn and maybe even something that I'm not comfortable at or I haven't yet been proficient haven't developed proficiency around that I have to learn I mean it's an important lesson for everybody regardless of how successful we've been in the past the world around us keeps changing there are things that are unprecedented like covid that are

(20:11) there's that then there's that argument well like well how do I own my audience again Tim used to you know Tim was came from that world where he you know that relationship that he had with an audience was you know they bought his right music and consumed his stuff and now you know they get him by way of another place and that by way of that's where all the the murkiness is and so now it's about being inventive about well how do we bring people back to right your stage and like your your thing and that's where you know the

(21:06) sustain itself and and so on um so interesting it's it sounds I it's interesting the other thing I was asking you before the show is all this Creative Energy takes it takes a lot of energy and you were mentioning how sometimes you just kind of go into a rabbit hole and you're just in there and I was expressing like wow I'm kind of jealous I would love to just spend you know uninterrupted X number of times you know days or hours or you know weeks just deep in a hole like exploring something um and it's really important that you

(22:10) day-to-day reality and so I'm imagining there might sometimes be a pull with trying to like the intake of just the ugliness that can exist in the world and the need to also be kind of connected how do you manage your own energy and how do you create that space for yourself to maintain your Creative Energy my grandfather had a quote he would say to me he was like you know when something's on the news by definition it's unlikely that's why it's news and it's it's one of those calming like

(23:11) know Thanos snap it like hey okay that's not happening right now um and just like you know zone out because I just think it's required like I don't think you have a choice like if you have to sit around and think about it like you're lucky because you're still breathing you know like you just kind of gotta I don't know I don't think there's a choice in it um because like it just it just it just is what it is um but there's you know there's uh movies and great shows on Tick Tock

(24:02) it's like I think urgency kind of Sparks it starts it it's like okay you know there's you know if if I don't that fear you know there's so many things I don't know it's like a if I don't do you know the fear that if I don't or the even the sense of Duty kind of keeps me on the ball like a feeling like okay you know somebody else would kill to do this yeah yeah yeah you know like you get to do this and like you know doing it for others and all those things I think can are are coping mechanisms in a way

(25:01) umbrella are you just gonna complain about it I don't know I I feel like I gotta you gotta just realize that the Sun comes out again I love it yeah so okay I'm gonna shift gears Hearts please come on okay artificial intelligence let's go please tell me what's going out I know that you are deep in AI I also know that I'm constantly getting stories like this about even people who invented AI are like we're going down a bad path watch out I know we talked about like young people who have been pursuing degrees

(26:08) the the the the the pretext for what's happening today but I think if you're a creative person and you know what good output looks like I think AI will help you get it and I don't think there's anything to fear about it if you know a good output looks like if you're a person though that loves the process and loves the you know the the to pull out the fountain pen and dip it in and you know lick the paper and get your Scrolls out and sit down and do all that process stuff you're going to hate AI because it

(27:06) different categories where you know there's a category a big category of art that is just about expression and so it's like you know I think air is going to be a different category of expression and expression is still going to exist right you can express like we saw that banana you know duct tape to the wall to our bosses ago and that's just about expression right right and how you perceive it is the art that's the whatever that is that relationship between you and that that's the art experience and that is always going to

(27:56) benefited from that sort of like you know autocomplete like we didn't always have Pinterest to make mood boards right right right you see what I mean and it's like that part it's like well no this is just another way of you know creating good output like part of it you know that process it always happens I just think now we have a new way of doing it and if you love the way old way of doing it you're going to be upset yeah so what is it that has got people who like our inventors of AI is so worried is it that

(28:51) comfortable with competition in any Marketplace economy civilization whatever you have to be comfortable competition and I think um these AIS have a crazy crazy like yeah you know so it's like you have to you have to be able to keep up with it I think now we can still keep our Pace with AI I don't know where it's going to go then around the corner but I do know that like we're still people at the end of the day and like what we want and what you know fills us is still gonna have a there's always

(29:50) technological iterations I mean major technological iterations you know when we went from you know file cabinets and offices and you know the huge data storage facilities to having laptops to having everything on our phone we've always gone through major technological um Transformations and so this is another one and we've always been afraid of them right we're always afraid of a major transformation at the beginning of it um and so again this is probably something that we'll get used to and it's part of our evolutionary or kind of

(30:44) like what do you think and you know how can I then I'm like listen man whatever your notes are you need to copy and paste them into your favorite AI program and ask the AI improve this and recommend things that I didn't consider love it and it could fix your plan for you what you know and it's like it could help you with ideation if you just thought about he's like y'all never thought about asking it yeah yeah to improve my idea or like you know like stuff like that and it's like some 12

(31:37) who it was it was some some conversation where somebody lost their job around there used to be a podcast Note Taker I think I saw this on Twitter podcast Note Taker and they I lost their you know nobody hey I can do that right like you can you know do that so but it's forcing us it's forcing us to like dig deep into ourselves and it also is you you know it was part of me that thinks I don't want us to lose our kind of muscle around certain things that are really important for us to have strength around but part

(32:30) part of his entire life that are totally different than things that I have strengths in and things that are definitely going to set him up for the next generation of success what are some of the things around AI that you're working on I know that you and um Timberland have been working on some really cool AI things anything we broke the internet a little bit that's it yeah yeah we did um we had this um seminar working on this um concept and we're calling it a personal art piece because I think it's it's the

(33:37) one day you know following up on this idea that he had in his head and this that that expressing that to me he walked in the studio a couple days ago and I had it and I had it and it was one of these like happy accidents and I played it and he went crazy ah he was like yo yo played in again and that's how I know like it was it was super dope and it was it was just one of those things and so you know in the AI world right now we're really kind of testing the electric fence because there is an electric fence

(34:42) know the the concept the reason why I call it like an art piece is because Tim was able to hear what a big sound what biggie would sound like over his music and it was just a personal revelation that we were able to share in a public way and you know it was it was something that just fit and you know what it really turned out what it became it was a conversation around well well what is this right because we're on the the heels of the weekend and the Drake song where somebody just came out and you know misappropriated the tones

(35:43) right all of these things are now the conversation instead of throw that out of here get that there's a lot of that too like a lot of like people are anti-ai voices but I'll honestly like knowing the process like it's really just like a filter it's really just like auto-tune you know and a lot of people are looking at it like it's a robot becoming biggie it's like no they're not becoming like it's it's honestly it's my talking voice with a filter on it right right and it's really to just give a

(36:36) imagine what a collaboration would sound like and to be able to do that across different genres and different voices and I mean and we've done certain things like that kind of in the past right we've had those kinds of things they may not have been um AI voices or clone voices but they're we've been able to have appreciation for those cross-generational or collaborative experiences and some people have taken Biggie's actual voice and made terrible mixes exactly so I'm like Hey listen it's which one is the

(37:38) for these catalogs that they would just be revived and you would see them revived back to the top of the or you know somewhere on the charts hey people are thinking about these artists right right right and so I'm gonna be honest with you like after I heard that biggie clone voice we did I listen I couldn't stop listening to Biggie all week I was listening to Biggie riding around in the car and I'm like yo I'm listening the copies made the the original worth yes more in a way I totally can understand that and versus

(38:32) what is that doing right now like how does this affect it like we don't know and so that's part of Tim's genes it's like hey man like you we just don't know but it's here now yeah you remember that the auto tune right how'd that go over right right all right so like what are we doing it didn't replace singers yep like we thought it would so it's like what is this going to be like we don't know so let's just throw it at the electric fence don't press what button

(39:20) around how and who gets to do it but you know I don't know I don't know where it's going to go none of us know where it's going to go and then rules are going to have to be revised over time because the world is changing and the technology is changing and you know all that we have available to us so so the the last question I want to ask you is a little bit about kind of your um other Venture uh light energy that so light energy yeah light energy is actually the um is the PowerHouse behind um a lot of these engagement

(40:20) on a mission to redefine that relationship and we do we've done it with um you know ways like we developed this app this app called the beatbox it was like an app it was like a Tinder for Beats and that's how we ran the whole live show uh where we were just looking for the hottest producers around the world and that was a tool that helped us redefine the relationship that an artist had or the audience had with the Timberland hey here's how I can get my music so on and so forth and so light energy uh you know the whole tagline we

(41:17) thing and so uh you know me and Tim's vision for it is really to um is really to be at the Forefront of this intersection between you know live streaming music gaming and you know what ownership looks like and digital communities and how you can you know put a circle around and make like a like a Timberland like a like a you know if you were playing if Timberland made his own SimCity game um are you working with other like artists to do this are there I'm assuming that there's like other people yeah oh my God there's some Geniuses oh

(42:19) to know over the last few years um you know building that ecosystem of ways to engage with somebody like a Tim yeah and then you know building that and taking that template and saying okay you know um other artists and audiences and and you know bringing those tools to to those uh other relationships in different ways um you know you can I don't want to tease a lot of the ideas but um one of the things that I you know it's so interesting talking to you because I started off talking about how the work that we do is so different and

(43:14) work with are either those people themselves or they're people who are employing those people and they're constantly looking for like what are some of the tips and techniques associated with helping people feel like they're thriving in their workplace like the work that they do is Meaningful like they have a sense of community and a sense of belonging and it sounds to me like some of those things are also things that you constantly have to be thinking about with the group of people you're coming with who come from

(44:12) work before so I know how to how what it feels like to be in it and when you're not in that energy it's like okay Hey listen we don't have that Synergy like we're missing like four people right now there's four imaginary people that would be you know turning an ax right now or turning a wrench right now and getting you know it takes activation energy um so I I think one just knowing what that feels like um but then also understanding I had to realize that in my solo journey to then um you know work with teams and like

(45:12) just being a battery for it like that's another part of it's like just giving somebody like hey like you know you did this you got this you know I you know thank you for working hard and like spotlighting some what somebody's been doing and like I don't know get one-on-one time like I don't it it there's a lot of ways that that goes into the back end great taking great advice having great people that give you advice yeah all those things I think those are all those are all fantastic quote like things that I'm going to

(46:07) you got to know how to take that heat it's a lot of pressure but it's important like that's the that's the leadership oh yeah if it don't work it's you yeah exactly y'all look good yeah by the way I love it I love it I feel like I have I walked into this conversation knowing that I was going to learn a lot and excited about it and now we're winding down thank you I'm so grateful that I had this conversation okay the last thing I'm going to ask you before we're done

(47:23) the song name the person who makes a Billy Joel thank you uh other me um Billy Joel Vienna uh it's a song that I found um by accident and it's just a song that you know it's about wanting to be somewhere and have a place that's calling your name and you know the whole message of the song is that that place is calling your name to and like it's waiting for you and so it's like one of those mantras that I kind of go back to and it kind of keeps me into places then like all right that this thing you're

(48:24) yet and all of that yeah Vienna is the answer to that feeling because it's like hey relax bro this is the journey it's waiting for you so like anyway and it's calling you too that's the good part too it's not just it's not just you like trying to force something that isn't already got your name on it I love it yeah oh I'm happy you didn't start with that one that's an emotional song I can't I actually don't even know the song I probably have heard it but I'm

(49:23) um I don't know if it all the time but um I think the saddest one is probably Dance With My Father oh that's a go-to oh my god oh no yeah my I lost my father almost a year ago right now and and we used to sing it we used to sing it even when we were together I can't believe it yeah you got me with that one everybody got their songs man we got to make a master play do I know another one you know another one that's really good just without now now um Prince another lonely Christmas she's you really got that that'll really make

(50:28) getting out of the way and letting the magic happen but also standing up for you know our people um and and also just that that desire to like make something happen just you know make it happen and bring the bring the space together that that we want to flourish in I really appreciate this time with you today it's been amazing this was an absolute pleasure thank you I can't wait to we got to kind of do it and do another one of these done done done after the AI aftermath I cannot wait I cannot wait good luck with