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I finished writing the report this week, and it feels like everything is finally coming together. The essay is complete with the introduction, methodology, literature, and art review, all properly cited and formatted. With that out of the way, I’ve had a moment to really reflect on how far Sonic Kitchen has come and how much the project has evolved since the beginning.

This started out as an experimental idea, something playful and sound-based, but over time, it’s grown into something layered and personal. Writing the report helped me realise just how much thought went into each stage. From remixing tracks with cultural care to balancing field recordings in the mix, every choice became part of a wider story about identity, memory, and place. The break I took after my grandfather passed away gave the project new meaning. Coming back to the work after that made me more intentional with every detail. It stopped being just an academic assignment and became something I wanted to honour properly.

Right now, the tracks are finished, the artwork is in place, and the final edits to this blog series are nearly done. Even though I haven’t submitted yet, I finally feel ready. I’m proud of the result, but even more proud of the process that got me here. This project taught me how to use sound as a form of storytelling, and that’s something I’ll carry forward to future projects.

While catching up with the rest of the project, I was also waiting for Tian to finish the album artwork. I had a bit of anxiety around the deadline since I didn’t want to submit anything incomplete or imperfect. The visuals were such an important part of tying the project together. I wanted the cover to reflect the concept clearly as a remix album grounded in cultural identity, food, and nostalgia.

About a week later than expected, Tian sent over the final illustration, and it was perfect. The final revision captured exactly what I’d imagined traditional cooking imagery reimagined through a musical lens, with earthy tones and textures that mirrored the tracks I’d spent months crafting. Seeing the final piece made the project feel especially real.

I started embedding the cover as the main image for each remix on my iTunes, as I plan to upload these tracks to SoundCloud sometime in the future. Even though everything was running a little behind, I was glad I waited. The delay ended up being worth it, the visual aspect brought a cohesion and identity that pulled the whole concept together, as I have said before.

At the end of April, everything came to a sudden stop because my grandfather had passed away unexpectedly. It was a massive personal loss, and I had to fly back to be with my family. In that moment, the project made me very stressed, as I couldn’t focus on both grieving and working. I couldn’t emotionally or mentally engage with the project, and that was something I had to accept.

I contacted my tutor to explain the situation, and I was granted a two-week extension. I’m genuinely grateful for that time. It meant I could come back to the work without panic and process things properly. I wasn’t just behind on deadlines, I was grieving, and I needed space to get through it.

When I finally returned to the project, my motivation was for my grandfather and how proud he would have been. Sonic Kitchen had always been about capturing culture and emotion through food, sound, and place, but after everything, it took on a deeper meaning. It became about memory, about where we come from and who we carry with us. That shift gave the project new weight and helped me reconnect with the heart of why I started this in the first place. It reminded me that sound isn’t just technical, but rather emotional, and sometimes even healing.

With the tracks and report almost complete, I reached out to an Indonesian illustrator called Tian Wijaya I had found through looking at artists specialising in album covers on Instagram and pitched the concept of my album, remixing traditional folk music with food vendor soundscapes. I sent him a wide range of options and ideas that I had for the cover art, like the colours, what landscapes went on, and the overall look of it.

The collaboration was smooth and intuitive. He understood exactly what I was going for and started sketching a concept that blended visual food elements with musical symbols. 

Having this visual component helped me visualise the project all together, and I fell in love with the idea all over again. It truly tied together the cultural elements and helped communicate what the music is trying to say before it’s even played. The artwork also gave me a stronger identity for the project, one that bridges place, sound, and memory. This collaboration taught me that good creative partnerships can elevate a project in ways you can’t do alone. It also deepened my appreciation for visual storytelling as part of sonic branding, a field I’m increasingly drawn to.

The next two weeks were all about cleaning up the finer details. I revisited each session to make subtle EQ changes, mainly cutting out harsh mids from some of the field recordings so they’d sit better with the melodic elements. It wasn’t major stuff, but those tiny fixes made a big difference in how smooth the project sounds as a whole.

I also changed the track order slightly to make the transitions feel more natural. Listening back to the full album in sequence, I could hear how each song had its own personality but still flowed together through textures, field sounds, and cultural identity. It actually felt like a story.

Alongside the audio, I finalised the report layout, cleaning up the formatting and making sure all my MLA citations were in order. It was a very admin-heavy week, but tying up all those loose ends made everything feel aligned visually, sonically, and academically. The project finally felt complete.

This week, I finally started writing the report. Referring back through the earliest stages of the project, such as the presentations, the brainstorming mood boards, and planning documents really made me realise how far the whole idea had come.

What started off as a vague plan to use “chef sounds” turned into something way more thoughtful. I’m glad I ended up creating a concept album shaped by culture, food, and personal connection. I started working on the introduction and methodology and started to plan where I was going to be referencing stuff like Feld’s theory of acoustemology and Demers’ views on sample ethics, which were ideas that really helped frame the whole project in a more academic way.

I also mapped out the Literature and Art Review, where I plan to talk about artists like Matmos and Cristóbal Tapia de Veer, who have influenced how I use sound as storytelling. This part of the process made me realise I wasn’t just making tracks, but building something with real thought and intention behind it. It felt like stepping into that role of a reflective artist, one who questions the “why” as much as the “how.”

Sakura Sakura was probably the most delicate track I worked on. The original folk melody is already so calm and minimal that I knew early on I had to approach it differently. I started by building a remix version in Logic Pro and introduced layers, using influences of trap remixes. I focused on letting each note breathe, shaping reverb and delay automation to build atmosphere without cluttering the mix.

There were fewer tracks in this session than any other, but I spent more time balancing them than I did on the busiest pieces. I used EQ to soften the melodic elements and created warmth with gentle harmonic layering. At its emotional peak, I introduced a subtle ambient pad underneath the melody just enough to add depth without distracting from the simplicity of the piece.

After I had the base remix, I added field recordings from my trip to Tokyo’s Tsukiji Market. You can hear the ongoing sizzling and light cooking noises all tucked gently into the mix. I used EQ to smooth out any harsh frequencies and sidechained them lightly like all my other remixes to let them breathe underneath the music. My goal wasn’t just to build a dramatic remix but to also create a moment. This track taught me how powerful music can be with the act of fusion. I wanted it to feel like you could hear the track as a background song for adventures through the Tokyo nightlife life market scenes.

Working on España Cañí was probably one of the most fun tracks to work on in this whole project. I see it as such a bold, dramatic piece, and I love that it has its recognisable features with its brass flourishes and Flamenco flair. I started by remixing the original in Logic Pro, keeping its theatrical energy but reshaping the structure to feel more grounded and cinematic. I played around with tempo and used filters and delay automation to give it more movement and build-up. Instead of letting the original sections play out at full force, I introduced tension and space to let the track breathe and feel a little less like a march and more like a story.

Once I was happy with the remix structure, I began layering in the street food textures. I used recordings from Youtube videos of Spanish tapas markets sounds like meat sizzling on planchas, metal tongs clinking, people calling out orders, and sangria glasses clinking. These were mixed in carefully as I didn’t want them to clash with the brightness of the brass and guitars, so I EQ’d out competing frequencies and sidechained them just slightly to the rhythm. The aim was to make España Cañí feel like it was soundtracking a busy summer evening in Seville, full of food, people, and passion, with the music rising naturally from the heart of it all.

After finishing Kembang Rawe, I started working on the Indian song Case, which felt like a completely different vibe from the other songs I’d touched so far. The original already had a smooth, Bhangra flow to it, so I focused more on building a sense of place around it rather than changing too much structurally. I spent time cleaning up the mix in Logic Pro, bringing certain instruments forward and giving the track more space to breathe. I used subtle EQ and compression to shape the dynamics and warm up the overall sound, as I wanted the whole thing to feel more intimate and alive.

For the ambience, I sourced sounds from Indian roadside vendors, layering in background voices, stir-frying, and the occasional beep from bajaj’s passing by. These weren’t added to act as percussion or rhythm, but were there to give the feeling of overhearing the track in real life. I used sidechain to tuck the ambience gently behind the main mix and reverb to make everything sit in the same space. The goal was to capture a moment like hearing Case playing from a radio while you’re eating samosas on a noisy New Delhi street. Even though it’s a chill track, I wanted the environment to give it a warm pulse, grounded in real-world texture.

After finishing Actor, I moved on to remixing Kembang Rawe. I followed the same general process as Actor, where I first created my own remix of the original song, and then I layered in environmental textures to bring it to life. I used Logic Pro to restructure the arrangement, focusing on giving it a modern pulse while keeping the soul of the track intact. I kept the key melodic elements but added spacey pads and subtle percussive textures to give it a more hypnotic, looping energy. I used automation and reverb to stretch moments out and build emotion. My goal was to make it feel nostalgic and dreamy, almost like a memory.

Once the remix had its own atmosphere, I brought in the street food soundbites. I pulled sounds from the second attempt of field recordings I conducted and managed to capture the sizzling oil, frying ‘gorengan’ (fried foods), the chatter of friends amongst the vendors, and clinks from metal woks. Just like with Actor, I wasn’t trying to turn these into beats, I wanted them to sit like a soundscape around the song. I EQ’d the harsher frequencies and sidechained the textures under the main groove to keep it balanced. The idea was to make it feel like Kembang Rawe was echoing out from a busy street stall in Yogyakarta (where the best street food in Indonesia is), with the culture seeping straight into the mix.