They Raised their Arms To The Wind As A Kid. Now They Command It As Storm.

0:00The wind, the clouds, the earth stand beside me and against you.

0:10Hell yeah. Hell yeah. I'm going to say that. I'm going to say that when everybody gives me some beef, I'll be like, you know what? You know what? Take that.

0:23Spawn on Me is the premier podcast spotlighting people of color. Every week we talk news, what we've been playing, and tell you who's invited to the cookout. Our show is all about talking about gaming through a prism of blackness because we are the culture. Welcome to Brakago, y 'all. What's good, everybody? Here in Brakago. We are rocking with someone who I have been dying to talk to for a very, very long time. voice of Ikora Ray voice of Storm voice of Queen Sindel Mara Juno thank you so much for being here on the show with me I'm so excited to talk to you because we have lots of things to discuss but how are you doing?

1:04how's everything going? I am lovely thank you so much for having me it is a pleasure oh my goodness so as a big fan of your work it is cool to see you continue to grow in this space it continues to be really fun to be able to say, oh, snap, I know who that is. That's awesome. Whenever you get a chance to voice a new character, voice someone who's become an iconic piece of the video game landscape. But you have an origin story, like most superheroes do. Talk to me a little bit about how you got into the game, because I think a lot of folks who listen to our show are either aspiring folks who want to get into the video game industry, especially aspiring folks who are people of color, folks from various backgrounds.

1:49they're always like, how do I get in? How are good ways to think about this stuff? Talk to me a little bit about your journey in the video game industry. Yeah, you know, I will say that every voice actor I've ever talked to has a different origin story. You know, it's just like people always want the kind of like the secret formula and there really is no one way to do it, which is the good news. You know what I mean? It's like you can kind of carve your own path. I would say at the end of the day, you know, you definitely want to make sure that whatever your path is, is that it revolves around acting and some sort of acting training.

2:21For me, I would say my very first sort of foray into voiceover started with, I was doing phone messages and phone systems for local businesses. A buddy of mine was like, hey, could you do my company voicemail? I was like, sure, that sounds great. And then that kind of expanded into regular prompts and things throughout the office and then other businesses. So that's kind of my very first voiceover experience. But then later, you know, I was working a regular nine to five job. But I had some friends who worked at a local cable affiliate for like Comcast. And they were like, you know, we always need voices to record local commercials and stuff like that.

3:03So I started dabbling, doing a little bit of that. And while I was there, one of my friends there told me that there was an opening for a local radio station. and so that they were looking for DJs. And at the time, you know, I was just miserable working my regular job. And so it sounded amazing getting on a microphone, listening to music. And so I applied thinking that it was a rock station. Come to find out it was a country music station. So I became the voice of a country music DJ middays on C107.5 KCIL, South Louisiana's home for today's best country and the legends. It's burned into your memory.

3:45But I did that for about, oh my God, almost eight years. And at the time I figured like, it doesn't get any better than this. I get to play music. I get to talk for a living. But radio was crazy, decided to bounce out of that. And then I still wanted to figure out how to use my voice. And that's when I started researching and voiceover, That whole world just opened up to me because I always wanted to be an actress, but I'm a private person. I'm kind of introverted. I didn't like the idea of being like all the way public all the time. So I kind of gave up the dream of being an actress. But once I discovered that, you know, voiceover existed and there's a way you can like use your voice and not and you can kind of be anything that you want to be and not be so limited by things.

4:31I was all in. For me, the way I got in was, you know, the area that I was in, we didn't have a lot of like voice, we didn't have any voiceover agencies, we certainly didn't have any voiceover coaching or anything like that. So I really had to rely on the net, you know, I was on YouTube constantly listening to podcasts, anything I could find, you know, like Crispin Freeman, voiceover mastery, whatever it was. Always, you know, in my in my headphones all day long, just trying to absorb information, constantly researching online. And that's kind of how I got my start. I started using what's called pay to play websites, which I don't recommend a lot of them nowadays, because, you know, a lot of them can be predatory.

5:13But at the time, it was a great marketplace where you could get in and you basically set up a profile and you could either have a free membership or you could just pay to have access to all the auditions. If you didn't pay, the clients had to find you. But that's kind of where I got my start. I built up a profile. I started listening to like other professional demos and some of my favorite voice actors and trying to figure out how to make a demo and getting all that going. And, you know, there's a lot of steps and it was overwhelming. It was my first time ever being an entrepreneur and not having a steady paycheck and everything steadily coming.

5:50And that's one thing I would stress as well. Not only do you want to, you know, learn to be a great actor and not just a great mimic or a great comedian, all those things are wonderful. But the more, the more elements of that that you have, the better. But you also want to have a good business sense. It really, you can't just kind of waltz in and just do this. Even if you happen to have representation, you know, I always say, you know, our agents get paid 10 % for a reason, you know what I mean? You're kind of expected to do 90 % of the rest, you know, in terms of showing up and promoting yourself and all the things that you need to do.

6:26And a lot of people don't realize that they're kind of waiting for that big break and the agent to be discovered and then they can kick back and it's all going to be gravy, but you never stop training, never stop. You know, networking is another thing I highly recommend. You know, if you have any sort of local, you know, whether it's acting workshops and workouts or just, just networking in the industry, you know, if you see there's like video game developers, you know, get to get meetups or, you know, animation socials, things like that show up. You would be surprised at how many things evolve naturally from just showing up into the room.

7:01That's one thing that as an introvert, it took me a long time to learn because I was kind of the wallflower. But I learned that even as a wallflower in the room, if you just show up to that room, people will notice and it will make a difference and people will consider you as part of the network. So show up where you can, where you feel comfortable. first of all highly first of all i gotta give you a high five through the screen because shout out to all our introverts fellow introvert here uh in that space uh two i love that you remember your calls your call letters and your call from your radio days it's burned into myself i used to do college radio so it is also burned into my mind too you get it so i'm like i immediately when i was uh looking up your work i was like oh another another another radio person i know how And I think there's another layer of that that I do want to come back to because I think there is a part of this art and a part of this work that you learn so many different and interesting skills from working in radio.

7:57And I think a lot of folks don't necessarily get that part, especially when you're doing the work that comes across, you know, in the ways that we are currently seeing that kind of come through. Absolutely. What were some of the what were some of the kind of like small things that you still carry with you now that you remember from radio that now has kind of translated really well to doing voice acting? I mean, you know, for me, yeah, a lot of people say, you know, radio can be the kiss of death if you come from a radio background. And then now you want to be a voiceover actor. Right. Because radio is kind of considering considered more like announcing.

8:29Right. You just have to be friendly and the guy next door. Whereas, you know, voice acting, you have to be an actor. And a lot of people don't quite make that transition as seamlessly, you know, because it's a lot easier to put on a polished smile and do your read. But I have to say, for me, I thought that radio was quite a blessing. You know, radio taught me how to record a commercial in 60 seconds, 30 seconds, 15 seconds, 5 seconds. And if, you know, a client says, hey, can you shave, you know, two and a half seconds off? I can do that mentally. I can do the next read two and a half seconds shorter.

9:05and that's another thing that people don't realize. Everybody wants to get into the voiceover industry as a anime or animation actor, which are probably some of the hardest genres to get into, at least animation, not anime per se. And video games as well can be tough to get into depending on how you approach it. And so what people don't realize is once you get representation, if you get an agent, they're going to want you to be good at commercial. So I learned a lot of great skills for recording commercials in radio, you know, because you had to learn that timing, but you had to learn that, you know, that friendly sound, but also know when to punch the brand name, right?

9:45And say it three times, you know the deal, make sure that phone number is nice and clear, but say it casually, you know, all those silly little things. So it can be, it can actually be a good thing in a way it can help your career as long as you don't just stall, you know, if you do come from a radio background, guys, don't just be like, oh, I've been on the mic for years. I got this. Just know that there's more steps to be had from there. Yeah. And I think I think a lot of folks who are doing that work, the conversations I've had over the years with folks who do voice acting and do commercial work in that space, they have constantly told me about how much they have learned from project to project and from From being malleable and being able to do commercial work and doing, you know, different ads that will run different lengths.

10:29And just like radio teaches you timing, too. Right. You talked about the shaving off the timing on it. But like you have a running clock in your head of like, all right, this ad break is about to hit in three seconds. A thousand percent. I need to get this thing out before the thing is so I can get those things together. I'm happy to hear you talk about that because I think it's a I think it is a lost art with the conversation around like content creation now and how folks are kind of getting into it. Very it's it's democratized in a great way. But it's also like there are folks who have those base skills that I think are are really, really important in those ways.

11:01It really does help. Yeah. And it helps, too, in other genres, not only commercial. If you want to look into doing promos, you know, like I'm a promo voice for stars, the cable channel. And I do stuff for Investigation Discovery. I do stuff for ABC. and it's good money. And guess what? Timing is everything in those industries, you know? So yeah, it can pay off in a lot of ways. Oh, see, thank you for saying that. And also talking about the business part is really important because the tax person will come get your ass. They will come find you. They do not care. They don't care. Okay. How nice your voice is.

11:33They were like, yeah, you'll need that money. That's right. I do want to talk about the kind of breadth and depth of some of your work. Like you worked on so many amazing, different iconic video game franchises. Destiny, God of War. You worked on the Arcane series, doing voices there. Do you remember the time when you kind of got to a space where you were, and maybe you're still working towards that space of saying like, well, I have a really good understanding of how this works now. Like this is a full fledged part of my career path that I'm really looking to dig into and to continue to foster and continue to push forward.

12:10That's a great question. I mean, I'm the sort of person like I never feel like I've made it or like that I've got I'm always looking to like what's next yeah you know it's like great I conquered that you know scratch that off the bucket list what's next you know and so I'm constantly trying to grow so it's hard for me to find this definitive line um I'm really trying to think of the moment where I started to feel like yeah like I'm a pro I got this and and super comfortable in every room I don't know all I can really say is it just kind of happens over time. It's just, it's just drip by drip, right?

12:47It's kind of like losing weight. You know, it's like you start a diet and before you know what your friends are saying, Oh, you know, you look, you really look good. Your face is looking and you don't know what they're talking about until like, maybe you see a picture, you know what I mean? Of you like weeks down the line. And then there's just something about separating yourself from the mirror and being like, Oh, I see it now. Right. So I have to say that's kind of what it's been for me. I've just kind of kept my nose to the grindstone, always like chasing the next thing. You know, I tried to keep my career very open to as many genres as possible.

13:21You know, I wanted to master promo. I wanted to master trailers. I was told women couldn't do trailers. I was like, we'll see about that. Start training on trailers. You know, I wanted to do all of the things. And so I was so busy doing that and then, you know, seeing what I could achieve and then actually being successful in a lot of those areas that I just started to feel more and more confident the more and more people kept showing up. And especially with the repeat, you know, buyers, that's always good. You have people that come back. That's when you know, OK, maybe I didn't screw it up so bad the first time.

13:53It's interesting because when you talk about the kind of like repeat work, right? Yeah. You've had a really interesting career in the fact that you have voiced one of my favorite characters of all time in Storm in multiple games. Mine too. Right? You did Marvel Midnight Suns. You did Ultimate Alliance 3. Now you're in Marvel Toe Con, which I'm very excited for and very bad at. People keep kicking my ass. You play the beta? Oh, a thousand percent. I was in there grinding it out and trying to make it happen. And these young kids was like, nah, old man. The eye-hand coordination is not for you, son.

14:30Ooh, noted. Okay, I'm excited. I'll be 48 this month, so it'll be the carpal tunnel is like, hey, fam, how you doing? Remember me? Remember me? I came back for your ass. Right. But it reminds me of the fact that, you know, you've done this very iconic character. This character that people love and are excited for and have been really excited to see more of. Yeah. When you are thinking about, you know, capturing that character, you're given the script, you're given the work to say, like, this is what we want you to embody. Yeah. How different has that been between projects when you're capturing the same character, but in so many different avenues and so many different games where the character itself is doing different things, is kind of being in a different even play field.

15:23You know, Alliance and Marvel Suns is like a totally different genre than the fighting game. And you have different parts of that game that you're doing. Right. What's it like to kind of embody a character multiple times and also differentiate those pieces? What's the thought process behind that? Well, I really love it because, you know, I feel like we're getting to explore so many different sides of Storm in different ways. You know, for instance, I really enjoyed, you know, Marvel Midnight Suns gave her so much narrative. You know, I learned so much about her backstory just just through diving into to the narrative.

15:58um whereas you know uh in tokan you know being being like a fighter game like this it's like you're gonna see a different type of energy from storm than you will in in say rivals or something else so i feel like you know the format of the game the the play style of the game uh the the how much how much narrative that she has it all allows these different avenues to kind of to learn more about her personality in a way and to express that. And I love that sort of challenge in putting myself, you know, because, you know, when you get to do recurring roles, you know, you don't want things to get stale.

16:36You don't want to be like, oh, I know her. I got this and just roll onto the mic. You know what I mean? I always try to imbue as much life as I can into the characters. So I really feel like, you know, having these different avenues to explore a character is just such a rare and awesome opportunity. And it really keeps you on your toes too and it keeps it fresh so i enjoy it yeah it's it's cool to hear you talk about it in that way because each of those different uh roles have been very different in the way that they uh kind of display themselves in game and also kind of just like how people attach themselves to it right like i remember very much so when storm got announced for the game how all the sisters in in my group were like, I'm main as Storm.

17:20I don't care what y 'all gonna do. I'm main as Storm. That's gonna be my character who I'm gonna be rocking with in those ways. It feels like you have not only with the breadth and depth of characters that you've portrayed and have taken on, that you have also found a really cool audience who is not only excited about the characters you're portraying, but you being the person who's doing that work. Are you finding now that you're having folks be like, Like, you know, you're in the mall somewhere and you're like saying the thing. If you're like, oh, I know who that is. Are you having those moments too now at this point?

17:53I'm having a little bit of that. And I blame my husband, Jordan Reynolds. He's a fellow voice actor. He's the voice of Adam Warlock in Rivals. And he's way more public on social media than I have been. I'm working on getting better. Hello. That's why we're here. But I've been like, you know, dipping my toe in, you know, but he definitely makes a point to bring me into the fray and let people know or inside. So people are starting to associate Oh, that's what she looks like. So, uh, yeah, it's happening more and more. Um, but it hasn't been a ton. And frankly, that is why I got into voice acting because I liked the idea of being anonymous in my draws and make it like I've literally been in the grocery store and I've heard commercials of myself on the overhead and nobody knew it was me.

18:40And I look like crap and it was amazing and i didn't have to worry about anything so so yes slowly but surely i'm becoming a little bit more public but it hasn't been terrible yet it's been manageable that's so great i mean i i'm sure that when you have the fan fest and all those things that come up and you're like hi i'm going to be appearing at such and such uh those those are going to be really fun even to continue to do more of those things to see how those are a blast how people love on you and give you props for all the work that you've been able to do. There's nothing like it. I mean, speaking to the kind of an intimidating layer of it, though, I know a lot of the space has been moving to performance capture.

19:20A lot of PCAP has been happening where folks are now bringing their likenesses alongside their voices to some of these games. Being an introvert, has that changed your mind in terms of what, like, alright, it's time to put the dots on and do that stuff too, though? You know, No, luckily, you know, likeness isn't quite the same as me, but still, yeah, it's pushing me into that realm. I keep saying the universe, you know, goddess, whatever it is, somebody is pushing me into the realm that I'm going to be on camera more and more. So I'm just making peace with it. I've started like taking classes and this is the way the winds are blowing.

19:56You know, video games are kind of becoming bigger than film and bigger than, I mean, I've heard that literally like e-sports arenas are, are filling out, you know, more than regular sports stadiums, you know what I mean? For, for football and things like that. So that's kind of the way we're going. So I'm just buckling up for the.

20:16Margo being in the store somewhere is like, I am not wishing for paparazzi for you. Cause that's terrible. Those things are crazy. Anytime that you're going to be in a space where you're going to be more visible in those ways, it'll be a blessing because you'll rock it and you'll kill it as always. Thank you. I do want to talk about the kind of physical layer of this because I think a lot of people don't pay attention to that. There's a lot of grunts. There's a lot of barks that you have to do. There's a lot of that stuff that winds up happening throughout multiple sessions of doing that work.

20:48How do you kind of take care of your voice in that way? Because those sessions cannot be short. They can be extremely long. They can be day sessions and stuff. How do you kind of keep your voice strong and keep those things in the spot. I'm not I'm not perfect. I have really bad habits. You know, I have like I literally went to like a vocal coach and they were like, you have all the worst habits, like, you know, I'll scream at football games. I have this really like hard guttural laugh, like, you know, just all these stupid things that I do. I don't drink enough water. So don't listen to me, but but listen to me because I've made a lot of mistakes.

21:23You know, I've I've learned, you know, if I have something coming up, you know, like, like saying going to be Lisa and Genshin Impact. Well, then I'm going to need, you know, a lot of lubrication on the voice. I want to make sure that I behave, you know, the next, the first few days before the session. So I've just learned, you know, look in the calendar, pay attention to what's coming up, try to stay as hydrated as possible. I have learned that, you know, there's just various things that you eat that really do. When I first started this business, I was like, I ain't giving up chocolate. I ain't giving up salsa.

21:54That's just, drink more water. you know there really is something to it um i actually was believe it or not i was the voice of nationwide directory assistants for like 10 years i was the voice of at &t uh not commercials but like internally on the phone yeah um and i would do these long recording sessions on site and i learned you know from doing so many extensive sessions what kind of affects you and what kind of doesn't so uh yeah i've learned like as much as you know say i love green tea green tea will dry me the hell out if I have some right before a session like when I see green tea in studios I'm just like you know like no tell them don't let them do it you know to me it's it's terrible but but everybody's different I've also learned that you know I've heard you're not supposed to have coffee before a session and for me like if I've been going for like several hours you know most video game sessions are four hour sessions yeah so if I've been going you know like hour three or whatever and I'm starting to feel a little just a little crud a little dried or whatever to me, a cup of coffee, hot coffee cuts right through it.

22:54But other people would be like, don't even, you know, it's dehydrating. So you just have to, it's things that you have to learn with time. But I would say, you know, don't poo poo on vocal health as silly as it seems and warm ups, learn to warm up, honey. Like it seems stupid. It seems like a waste of time. You may not notice a difference. If you're not noticing a difference, find a new warmup, but you need to be warming up before sessions. Your longevity will thank you for it. You know, there's little tips and tricks and things that you can do to kind of get you through a rough spot like you know i like the vocal straws and stuff um where you kind of like blow through a straw and it creates all this pressure and you know yeah and you can literally even like you know say you're in a video game session you're doing all these grunts and everything and you're just your voice is starting to peter out um a lot of times the vocal star i actually have one here um you know it's just like a straw and you blow into it and it creates this pressure and it kind of it's i can't describe it i am not a otolaryngologist or whatever it creates some sort of pressure on the vocal cords that kind of relieves some of the pressure but what i found is it'll get you through a brief period but if you need to go for another hour there is no substitute for hydrating and warming your butt up so oh see that's good because i i know i go into podcasts and do stuff i don't warm up i don't even know what the warm-up is i come outside like red fox every time i'm like I'll send you Red Fox.

24:15It sounded like Red Fox and James Brown after having a conversation. No, indeed. No, I'll send you some warm-ups. I'm telling you, it will change your life. You're going to sit there going, how did I just get through another hour like that? I would gladly take it. From a professional, I will gladly take it, for sure. You got it. You got it. I know that usually sessions are sometimes kind of, you know, solo. Usually they're kind of slowly kind of coming in and doing those work, doing those piece by piece. Has there been times when you got a chance to work with co-stars where you've had other folks and in those spaces?

24:51Like, have you got a chance to work with any celebrities who are also in those spaces to be able to do sessions in those ways? Actually, yeah, yeah. PCAP has been the opportunity to do it. You know, most sessions are solo. But when we are doing, you know, PCAP sessions, obviously we're working as a team, you know, in the volume. And it's wonderful. Yeah, I've gotten to work with, you know, Troy Baker and Roger Craig Smith. And one of the wildest stories was about two years ago, I was the announcer for the Screen Actors Guild Awards, the SAG Awards. Yeah. And Elijah Wood and Sean Astin had like their first onstage reunion in I don't know how many years since The Lord of the Rings, right?