Paul Sebastien

Last updated
Paul Sebastien
Birth namePaul Sebastien Skrowaczewski
Genres
Occupation(s)
  • Musician
  • producer
  • composer
  • marketing officer
Years active1991–present
Member ofBasic Pleasure Model
Formerly of

Paul Sebastien, born Paul Sebastien Skrowaczewski, [1] is an American musician, producer, composer, and technology executive. He is known for being a founding member, singer and co-writer of techno group Psykosonik. He also composed for many video game soundtracks and worked in-house at Thomas Dolby's company Beatnik, which acquired his music publishing company Power of Seven.

Contents

As a technology executive, he has held chief roles at both startups and large companies, spanning Chief Marketing Officer, General Manager, CEO and President roles. He is the son of the late Polish-American composer Stanisław Skrowaczewski. [2]

Early life

Sebastien graduated from the Blake School in Minneapolis. [1]

Music career

Psykosonik

Prior to forming Psykosonik, Sebastien was involved in a number of unsuccessful music projects. [1] During the early 90s, Sebastien met Theodore Beale at The Underground in Minneapolis, which led to them starting a duo with Beale on keyboard and Sebastien on guitar and vocals. They were later joined by drummer Michael Larson and production engineer Daniel Lenz, the latter of which was also responsible for co-writing tracks with Sebastien. This led to the formation of Psykosonik, and they began recording electronic music at Sebastian's apartment where he had a recording studio, and later found performance opportunities in local clubs including First Avenue, 7th Street Entry, and Glam Slam.

The group released two albums in 1993 and 1995 respectively: Psykosonik and Unlearn. A remix of the track "Unlearn" by Josh Wink appeared on the soundtrack of the 1995 movie Mortal Kombat (although not featured in the movie itself), which became Platinum [3] in less than a year reaching No. 10 on the Billboard 200, [4] and was included in the 2011 Guinness World Records Gamer's Edition as the "most successful video game spin-off soundtrack album". [5] He hangs the Platinum award in his music studio to this day. [1] This led to them creating "It Has Begun" for the compilation album Mortal Kombat: More Kombat and "Panik Control" for the sequel Mortal Kombat Annihilation . Additionally, a selection of tracks by Psykosonik appeared in the American version of the game X-Kaliber 2097 ; [6] these were resequenced for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System by Ali Lexa.

Other projects

In 1994, Sebastien started the music publishing company Power of Seven. He worked on a number of games under this name, including CyClones , and the title themes of Marathon 2: Durandal and Marathon Infinity , as well as the multimedia content product Hip Clip Music. The following year, Power of Seven was acquired by Thomas Dolby's audio technology company Beatnik (then known as Headspace), [7] although the acquisition was not announced until 1996. This led to Sebastien becoming Headspace's production director, where he was responsible for content production, as well as composing for and managing the Headspace Music Library, and also worked on other multimedia projects. He highly enjoyed working with Dolby at Beatnik, as he was a large fan of his music during his teenage years and both shared common interests including the then-nascent Web, interactive media, windsurfing and other shared interests. [8] [9] As part of Headspace, he served as one of the composers for the game Obsidian .

Sebastien left the company in 1998 and went on to pursue new leadership roles at Silicon Valley startups including Enliven which was acquired by Excite.com in 1999. He also continued work on music and video games projects including Oni , along with fellow ex-Beatnik composer Brian Salter and sound designer Kim Cascone. Other music in the game was composed by Martin O'Donnell in collaboration with Michael Salvatori.

Although Sebastien became known for his work at Silicon Valley and Seattle companies as a technology executive, he continued writing music and eventually formed an electronica/new wave duo with Caesar Filori called Basic Pleasure Model in 2003. During the mid-2000s, they released three singles and also performed as an opening act for Thomas Dolby. [10] The duo released further singles between 2019 and 2020. [11] Sebastien has also released solo tracks, such as "The Turning of Summer" and "Midnight on Reef Island", and in 2022 he released the synthpop track "Summertime (I Don’t Care)".

Business career

Following his time at Beatnik with Thomas Dolby, Sebastien pursued new business and marketing leadership roles at Silicon Valley companies (and eventually Seattle, as part of joining the early Xbox division of Microsoft in 2001). In 1999, following the acquisition of online advertising startup Enliven, he was recruited for a marketing leadership role at the startup Zaplet. Two years later, he joined Microsoft, working in multiple leadership roles. He also joined Zipper Interactive in 2005 as an executive who contributed to the success of the SOCOM U.S. Navy SEALs games franchise in partnership with Sony; the company was acquired by Sony in 2007. Subsequent companies he worked at include Disney Mobile (via acquisition of startup Tapulous), SugarSync, and T-Mobile [12] (via acquisition of startup ChooChee).

He was then recruited in 2014 to build and lead a new B2B SaaS company for on Udemy, serving as General Manager and co-creator of Udemy for Business. [13] Later, he joined Helpshift in 2017 as a chief marketing officer, [14] followed by Offensive Security in 2019 as Chief Marketing Officer where he helped build and scale the company to global adoption across B2C and B2B. In 2022, he left Offensive Security to join Raoul Pal at finance education platform and media company Real Vision, as its President. [15]

Sebastien has developed an interest in cryptocurrency and Web3. This started in 2013 with bitcoin mining, and in 2017 his friend Mauvis Ledford introduced him to a network of crypto experts. [16]

Personal life

Sebastien lives with his wife Julia Sebastien, and they have three children. [1] His father is composer Stanisław Skrowaczewski, who died in 2017.

Discography

With Psykosonik

With Headspace

With Basic Pleasure Model

Solo works

Video games

YearTitleNotes
1994 CyClones composer and sound effects; with Theodore Beale and Kevin Schilder
1995 Marathon 2: Durandal title theme composer
1996 Marathon Infinity title theme composer
Tracercomposer
1997Nebula Fightercomposer
2001 Oni composer; with Martin O'Donnell, Michael Salvatori, and Brian Salter
2003NHL Rivals 2004sound director
NHL Fever 2004sound director
2005 SOCOM 3 U.S. Navy SEALs producer; with Prem Krishnan
SOCOM U.S. Navy SEALs: Fireteam Bravo crosstalk producer; with Prem Krishnan
2006 SOCOM U.S. Navy SEALs: Combined Assault additional producer; with Tony Iuppa and Cade Myers

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Thomas Dolby</span> English musician (born 1958)

Thomas Morgan Robertson, known by the stage name Thomas Dolby, is an English musician, producer, composer, entrepreneur and teacher.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stanisław Skrowaczewski</span> Polish composer and conductor (1923–2017)

Stanislaw Pawel Stefan Jan Sebastian Skrowaczewski was a Polish-American classical conductor and composer.

<i>Oni</i> (video game) 2001 video game

Oni is a third-person action video game developed by Bungie West, a division of Bungie, and published by Take-Two Interactive. Released in 2001, it was Bungie West's only game. Gameplay consists of third-person shooting with hand-to-hand combat, with a focus on the latter. Originally planned just for the Mac OS and Windows, a PlayStation 2 port was concurrently developed by Rockstar Canada. The game's style was largely inspired by Ghost in the Shell and Akira and shares the same genre, being set in a cyberpunk world.

Ermac Mortal Kombat character

Ermac is a character in the Mortal Kombat fighting game franchise by Midway Games and NetherRealm Studios. Debuting as an unlockable character in Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 (1995), he is an amalgam of the souls of deceased warriors and possesses telekinetic abilities.

<i>Mortal Kombat 3</i> 1995 video game

Mortal Kombat 3 is a 1995 arcade fighting game developed by Midway Games and first released into arcades in 1995. It is the third main installment in the Mortal Kombat franchise and a sequel to 1993's Mortal Kombat II. As in the previous games, it has a cast of characters that players choose from and guide through a series of battles against other opponents. The game avoids the tournament storyline of its predecessors, as various warriors instead fight against the returning Shao Kahn, who has resurrected his bride Sindel and started an invasion of Earthrealm.

<i>Mortal Kombat</i> (1995 film) 1995 film by Paul W. S. Anderson

Mortal Kombat is a 1995 American fantasy action film directed by Paul W. S. Anderson and written by Kevin Droney. Based on the video game franchise of the same name, it is the first installment in the Mortal Kombat film series. Starring Linden Ashby, Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa, Robin Shou, Bridgette Wilson, Talisa Soto, and Christopher Lambert, the film follows a group of heroes who participate in the eponymous Mortal Kombat tournament to protect Earth from being conquered by malevolent forces. Its story primarily adapts the original 1992 game, while also using elements from the game Mortal Kombat II (1993).

<i>Mortal Kombat II</i> 1993 video game

Mortal Kombat II is a fighting game originally produced by Midway for the arcades in 1993. It was ported to multiple home systems, including MS-DOS, Amiga, Game Boy, Game Gear, Sega Genesis, 32X, Sega Saturn, Super Nintendo Entertainment System, and PlayStation only in Japan, mostly in licensed versions developed by Probe Entertainment and Sculptured Software and published by Acclaim Entertainment.

<i>Mortal Kombat</i> Video game series and multimedia franchise

Mortal Kombat is a media franchise centered on a series of fighting video games originally developed by Midway Games in 1992.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Steve Ritchie (pinball designer)</span> American pinball designer

Steven Scott Ritchie is an American pinball and video game designer. His career began in the 1970s, Ritchie holds the record for best-selling pinball designer in history. He has been called "The Master of Flow" due to the emphasis in his designs on ball speed, loops, and long smooth shots. Ritchie was also the original voice of Shao Kahn in the Mortal Kombat fighting game series, serving as the announcer of Mortal Kombat II (1993), Mortal Kombat 3 (1995), and the updates to Mortal Kombat 3. He is the older brother of fellow pinball designer Mark Ritchie.

Psykosonik was an American techno music group. The band had four Billboard charted Top 40 hit singles on the Dance Club Songs chart. Psykosonik was featured on the Mortal Kombat Annihilation soundtrack.

<i>Mortal Kombat</i> (1995 score) 1995 film score by George S. Clinton

Mortal Kombat: Original Motion Picture Score is the instrumental score album released to accompany the Mortal Kombat (1995) film. The music was composed by George S. Clinton with additional guitar work provided by Buckethead and drums by Brain.

Kim Cascone is an Italian American composer of electronic music who is known for his releases in the ambient, drone, industrial and electro-acoustic genre on his own record label, Silent Records.

<i>Mortal Kombat</i> (2011 video game) 2011 fighting video game

Mortal Kombat is a 2011 fighting game developed by NetherRealm Studios and published by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. It is the ninth main installment in the Mortal Kombat series and a soft reboot of the series. The game was released for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 systems in April 2011, and a PlayStation Vita port was released in May 2012. An expanded version of the game, titled Mortal Kombat: Komplete Edition, was released for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 in February 2012 and for Microsoft Windows in July 2013.

<i>Mortal Kombat</i> (1992 video game) 1992 fighting game

Mortal Kombat is a 1992 fighting game developed and published by Midway. It is the first entry in the Mortal Kombat series and was subsequently released by Acclaim Entertainment for nearly every home platform at that time. The game focuses on several characters of various intentions who enter a martial arts tournament with worldly consequences. It introduced many key aspects of the Mortal Kombat series, including the unique five-button control scheme and gory finishing moves called Fatalities.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Liu Kang</span> Mortal Kombat character

Liu Kang is a character in the Mortal Kombat fighting game franchise by Midway Games and NetherRealm Studios. Depicted as Earthrealm's greatest warrior and champion, he is the protagonist of the series. He debuted in the original 1992 game as a Shaolin monk with special moves, which were intended to be the easiest for players to perform. Since his introduction, Liu Kang has appeared as playable in every main installment except Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance (2002). He is also one of the protagonists of the action-adventure spin-off Mortal Kombat: Shaolin Monks (2005).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dan Forden</span> American sound programmer

Daniel Warner Forden is an American sound programmer and music composer. He has worked on video games developed by Midway and its successor NetherRealm Studios since 1989. Forden achieved recognition for his audio work on the Mortal Kombat fighting game series where he was part of the original design team. He is also recognized for his Easter egg appearances in the series. Outside of video games, Forden played bass guitar in the progressive rock band Cheer-Accident from 1992 to 1993.

<i>Mortal Kombat</i> (2021 film) American film by Simon McQuoid

Mortal Kombat is a 2021 American martial arts fantasy film directed by Simon McQuoid from a screenplay by Greg Russo and Dave Callaham, based on the video game series of the same name created by Ed Boon and John Tobias. The film serves as a reboot of the Mortal Kombat film series. It stars Lewis Tan, Jessica McNamee, Josh Lawson, Tadanobu Asano, Mehcad Brooks, Ludi Lin, Chin Han, Max Huang, Joe Taslim, and Hiroyuki Sanada. The film follows Cole Young, a washed-up mixed martial arts fighter who is unaware of his hidden lineage or why the assassin Sub-Zero is hunting him down. Concerned for the safety of his family, he seeks out a clique of fighters that were chosen to defend Earthrealm against Outworld.

Wilbert Roget II is an American composer known for his work on video game music, particularly Mortal Kombat 11 (2019), Call of Duty: WWII (2017), and Lara Croft and the Temple of Osiris (2014). His scores have won multiple awards and nominations from the Game Audio Network Guild and the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Beatnik (company)</span> Internet audio company

Beatnik, Inc., founded as Headspace, Inc., was a company that specialized in interactive audio technology. It was founded by musician Thomas Dolby in 1993 along with co-founder Mary Coller. It is best known for its Beatnik technology, which was used to provide sound in small file sizes on websites and later in billions of phones during the 2000s to play polyphonic ringtones, with its key clients being Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Samsung, and various other manufacturers. During its earlier years it also produced music for video games such as Cyberia and Obsidian.

<i>Mortal Kombat</i> (2021 soundtrack) 2021 film score by Benjamin Wallfisch

Mortal Kombat: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack is the score album to the 2021 film Mortal Kombat, based on the video game franchise of the same name and a reboot of the Mortal Kombat film series. Composed by Benjamin Wallfisch, the 24-track album was released on April 16, 2021 by WaterTower Music and is led by two singles: "Techno Syndrome 2021" an experimented track from the eponymous theme song that featured in the video game series' soundtrack by The Immortals was released on April 9, and "I Am Scorpion", a theme for the character Hanzo Hasashi / Scorpion was released on April 15, before the album.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 Sebastien, Paul. "Bear Pause: Paul Sebastien '87". The Blake School.
  2. ↑ Ross, Jenna (March 29, 2017). "Musical memorial pays tribute to Minnesota conductor Stanislaw Skrowaczewski". StarTribune.
  3. ↑ "Search Results for Mortal Kombat". Recording Industry Association of America . Retrieved April 12, 2017.
  4. ↑ "Mortal Kombat [Original Soundtrack] - Original Soundtrack | Awards". AllMusic. August 15, 1995. Retrieved September 29, 2015.
  5. ↑ J.C. Reeves (February 10, 2012). "'Mortal Kombat' Franchise Boasts Numerous Guinness World Records". Game Rant. Retrieved April 9, 2015.
  6. ↑ Kirn, Peter (October 14, 2021). "The trippy, rave-y 90s project who scored Mortal Kombat and Marathon". CDM.
  7. ↑ "HEADSPACE - PRESS RELEASE: Headspace Acquires HIP CLIP Music Library, Power of seven Relocates to California". September 1, 1996.
  8. ↑ Paul Sebastien via [@ringtonebangers] (October 18, 2021). ""Working with and under Thomas was nothing less than a dream, on several levels, as I was both a longtime rabid fan of his music since my teenage years and we shared so many of the same interests"" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  9. ↑ Dolby, Thomas (2016). The Speed of Sound: Breaking the Barriers Between Music and Technology: A Memoir. Flatiron Books. pp. 173, 174. ISBN   978-1250071842.
  10. ↑ Palmer, Tamara (April 20, 2006). "Ring a Bell?". The Stranger.
  11. ↑ Yücel, Ilker (July 3, 2020). "Basic Pleasure Model returns with new singles and music video". ReGen Magazine.
  12. ↑ Norris, Jodi (November 22, 2021). "A B2B SaaS marketing strategy from zero to one with Paul Sebastien, CMO at Offensive Security". 93x.
  13. ↑ Black, Lee Bob (September 30, 2018). "On Gamification and Corporate Learning: Lee Bob Black Interviews Paul Sebastien of Udemy for Business".
  14. ↑ "Helpshift Brings on Chief Marketing Officer Paul Sebastien and Vice President of Business Development Chuck Coulson". Business Wire. January 18, 2018.
  15. ↑ Ryan McHutt & Chris Ries (March 16, 2022). "CryptoSphere Episode 05: Paul Sebastien". CryptoSphere (Podcast). Buzzsprout.
  16. ↑ Sebastien, Paul (January 7, 2022). "Why I'm going all in on Crypto, NFTs and Web3". LinkedIn.[ dead link ]
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.