Full video

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I see a striking similarity between

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music and code.

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When you're producing music or when

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you're making music, that product that

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you're making is a stream of bits. It's

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ones and zeros. And every single action

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you take, every stroke of the guitar,

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every conversation you have in the

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studio, affects how those bits come out.

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I'm doing two things that I really love

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to do, and I think that they fuel each

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other.

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My name is Brandon Tory. I'm a musician

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and a senior engineer at Google working

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on AI.

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As a teenager, I lived in a homeless

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shelter. I met a lot of kids from that

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walk of life.

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I grew up a couple blocks down from

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where there was a lot of drug activity

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and things like that. And a lot of my

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friends went through that, so obviously

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that was a challenge. It was like, man,

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I want to get into music. I want to do

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these other things.

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When I was living in the shelter, one of

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the things I brought with me was this

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computer that I had built from parts

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that I found around the neighborhood,

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and I spray-painted it black. And one of

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the things I was doing was coding. I

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started to live this double life where I

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was working as an engineer, and then I

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would come back with my music and do

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these things, and trying to balance my

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life as an artist and my life as an

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engineer separately.

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Once again, I want to thank everybody

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for coming out tonight. I'm going to

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play the records for you guys. I'm not

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expecting you to stand still. You know,

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let's have a good time. I appreciate you

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guys. Thank you.

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First time I played music, it felt like

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you get this sense of understanding.

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And so, what happens is you start to

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rap, you're getting these freestyle

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cyphers or these battles or these music

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sessions, and everybody's really just

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exchanging their story, and you start to

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realize we're really not that different.

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And music just made it feel very, very

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obvious and very, very powerful.

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Me and Benny got a joke when he show me

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diamond chain, she going to take forever

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shipping and I'm going to take forever

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paying.

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First 6 months in LA, a friend of mine

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said, "Hey man, there's this contest

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with Timbaland. I think you should enter

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it." And so, I just entered it and then

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one day I got a call. I picked up my

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phone and it's Timbaland.

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Timbaland is arguably the best producer

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of all time. He's right next to Dr. Dre

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and some of the other legends. And for

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me, that just felt like such a

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breakthrough. I think all independent

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artists can relate to that because we

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all take this risk and this and this

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jump to say, "Man, we want to be

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creative. We want to create our art."

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And you go through this grind period

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where you just don't know if you're even

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making any progress at all.

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And so, to have Tim call me and say,

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"Man, I love what you're doing." That

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gave me this huge surge of energy to

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keep fighting and to keep creating.

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My long-term goal will always be to be a

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creator.

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All dreams and all things that you're

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trying to accomplish have certain

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qualities in common. You're trying to

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constantly create something from

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nothing. And whether or not that

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involves coding or music or any of the

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tools at my disposal, I'm willing to use

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those to create better experiences.