For LA-based producer Venessa Michaels, the past is an invaluable template for looking toward the future. Nostalgia is at the core of her self-coined ‘2090’ genre, a retro-futuristic sound that blends various forms of club music with Y2K-inspired hip-hop and pop.

Michaels has nurtured this style for years, leading to collaborations with J.Worra, Lil Texas, and Kaleena Zanders; touring slots with NIKI, Raury, 6lack, Party Favor, and Krewella; performances at festivals such as Coachella, Splash House, and Camp Flog Gnaw; and the creation of the theme song for the DreamWorks Netflix show KIPO and the Age of Wonderbeasts.

Now, Venessa Michaels is expanding her sphere even further as she gears up to release her debut LP, Sent From Saturn – a full-length project that promises to exhilarate listeners with a lavish mix of house, pop, tech-house, breakbeat, and more.

What can we expect from your debut LP?

We’re going on a field trip to space.

What inspires you the most from the Y2k era?

Anything Timbaland produced, No Doubt, Sublime, Amy Winehouse, Destiny’s Child.

What’s a Y2k song you wish was yours?

This question is so hard because that era was so special…Ms. Jackson or Hey Ya by Outkast?  Bootylicious by Destiny’s Child? Toxic by Britney? Gotta Get Thru This by Daniel Bedingfield? This is so hard, I can go on forever.  

What’s your favorite thing to do to decompress?

I might be putting myself on blast for this one, but I’ve been watching Bachelor in Paradise.  

Walk us through your production process. How do you build a track from nothing?

Usually I’ll start from either making a percussion loop or I’ll play with chords and sounds until I’m inspired.  Then I’ll fill in the blanks.  It’s all really trial and error until you are in a flow.  Sometimes I’m so deep in a flow that I really forget what I’m doing as I go & come back to listen to something that I love or never want to hear again.  Honestly though, it’s all so important.  Every phase of the process matters and will get you through to the end.  You just have to sit there and finish the job, which is a lot easier said than done.  There’s so many details to producing.  That’s just if I’m working alone.  But working with an artist is a whole different world.  Same sort of process, starting from energy and tapping into what the mood is then building from there.  I enjoy sampling artists’ vocals and little vocal runs to pull from and adding layers to the mix.  It all really depends on the day, though.  No one day is ever the same in building a track.

How do you separate your producer soul from your artist soul?

I think it’s more like…how do you tap into another artist’s world versus being stuck in your own.  At the end of the day there’s so many different parts of being human.  As long as I can connect with someone else and really be authentic to their energy and what they want, then my producer soul should be able to support their artist soul while my artist soul is also in the same room.  

What’s the main quality one needs to have in order to master this job, especially in this crazy industry?

To master the job of being in the music industry? Yeah you have to be out of your mind and never ever give up.  

What’s your ideal scenario for your retirement? 

Being somewhere close to family and friends, vibing on an island or a beach enjoying the little things together.