Walter White's essential composing lesson

My Dearest Tortured Composer,

I write to you today with a composing lesson from one of the world’s most popular shows. 

A show that many would assume could not teach you a single thing about music or composing.

I’m talking of course about Breaking Bad.

If you aren’t familiar, it is a show about a chemistry teacher that cannot afford his medical bills so decides to start selling meth.

The show centers around Walter White.

And one scene in particular contains an insight that may make your composing life much more enjoyable.

Walter White walks into the office of Tuco Salamanca.

Tuco is a volatile drug lord who enjoys snorting methamphetamines off hunting knives.

Tuco had recently beaten the piss out of Walt's partner and stolen a pound of meth.

This time, Walt comes prepared. In his hand: a bag of white crystals. Seemingly another pound of meth.

The negotiation goes south fast. Tuco starts threatening Walt.

Then Walt grabs a tiny crystal, spins around, and throws it against the wall.

BOOM!

Massive explosion. Windows blown out. Eerie ringing fills the air like wartime shellshock.

As the white dust settles, Tuco sees Walt holding up the bag. One little crystal caused that explosion. Imagine what one pound could do?

Tuco asks: "What IS that?"

Walt pauses. Looks at the bag. Then back at Tuco...

"Fulminated mercury. A little tweak of chemistry."

Here's why this matters to you:

Most composers treat their music like regular meth. One piece, one use, one chance.

They write something to release on Spotify, they write something for a project or film, they create an etude to practice writing for a particular instrument.

But what if you could turn every piece into fulminated mercury? One composition that explodes across multiple platforms, multiple opportunities, multiple chances to succeed?

That's Fulminated Composing.

The Surface Area of Your Luck

Before we go on with this concept, we need to take a quick detour.

I want to tell you about a fat ship captain named Dmitri who loves Prokofiev.

Dmitri is fat. He smokes cigars. He only wears black. His voice sounds like two pieces of asphalt being rubbed together in a sandpaper factory. He smells like oysters.

Dmitri studied at the Tchaikovsky Moscow State Conservatory, but after discovering composing was such a risky career path, he opted for something much more stable:

Treasure hunting.

Based on historical evidence, Dmitri knows a Spanish galleon sank somewhere in a 200-mile radius off the French coast. The gold could be worth hundreds of millions.

So he divides this radius into little squares and searches them one by one with his ship "Maddalena" (named after Prokofiev's unfinished opera).

Every day Dmitri searches would feel like failure to most people. They want daily wins. Weekly paychecks. Confirmation they're on the right path.

But should Dmitri find that ship, none of the "failed" days matter.

This is your composing career.

You don't know which email will connect you with the director who changes everything.

You don't know which piece will get licensed.

You don't know when your luck will compound.

You don’t know when you’ll meet the head of music licensing for Paramount who needs a piece of music in YOUR style that day and will connect you with all of your dream directors.

Almost every successful creative person I’ve met has some weird story like this.

But here's the difference between you and Dmitri: He can only search one square of ocean at a time.

You can explode one piece of music across 6-7 different opportunities simultaneously.

The 6-7 Star System

For everything you write, you can identify 6-7 uses for your piece:

1. Portfolio Addition - Goes into your professional reel

2. Music Library Submission - Submit to libraries or production houses

3. Content Marketing - Create a "behind the scenes" video showing your process

4. Demo Reel Update - Fresh content for your website

5. Outreach Material - Send to specific directors whose style aligns

6. Social Proof - Post snippets to show you're actively creating and a real living person, not an AI robot

7. Streaming Platforms - You never know who's listening. Release an album that you can send to directors or game developers to give a hint of your style (and show you take yourself seriously).

One piece. Six or seven explosions. Six or seven different ways it can work for you.

Even if directors never respond, you've won on six other fronts.

Even if libraries reject it, you've built your portfolio, created content, made connections.

You're Increasing The Surface Area of Your Luck

Think mathematically:

Write one "perfect" piece per year = one lottery ticket

“Fulminate” 20 pieces at 7/10 quality = 140 different chances for success

Writer Scott Scheper took this concept from Breaking Bad and applied it to content creation. He calls it "Fulminated Digital."

One email becomes a blog post, social media content, a video script, the start of a book.

The same thing can work for composers.

This probably seems obvious. Like why not do that. But so few people do.

The Compound Effect Nobody Tells You About

Let's say you follow this system for one year. One piece per month.

That's 12 pieces.

Each piece goes to 6-7 places. That's 72-84 different touch points where someone could discover you.

When someone Googles you six months from now, they don't find one piece. They find TWELVE pieces ready to binge. They see you're serious. Professional. Prolific.

That content library becomes proof you're not a hobbyist.

And it compounds. Piece #1 might not get attention until piece #20 goes viral and brings people back to your archive.

Here's What Actually Happens

A friend of mine was releasing music to crickets for years.

Someone he met at a party knew someone starting a podcast. With a budget.

They picked one of his dusty old pieces as the theme. It was 10 years old. He made good money.

As the podcast grew, someone asked who wrote the theme music.

This someone was well-connected in entertainment.

My friend ended up featured on a major talk show. A MAJOR talkshow that got him many gigs after that.

More gigs than he knew what to do with.

All from a piece he thought was dead.

The Video That Proves Everything

I just saw a TikTok that made me want to shake every perfectionist composer.

This guy shows how a song he wrote 15 YEARS AGO is now going viral worldwide.

Fifteen years it sat there. Now? Millions of plays.

That piece you think is "only 6/10"? Could be someone's favorite song in 2040.

That melody you're embarrassed by? Could soundtrack someone's wedding.

That chord progression you think is "too simple"? Could blow up on TikTok.

But ONLY if it exists. ONLY if you fulminate it into the world.

I was in a production duo years ago. We haven’t released anything in 5 years. And I just saw on Spotify that our listeners increased by 62% last year and added to 128 playlists. Random music with zero promotion.

But it’s out there. “Vibrating” and creating luck that I can’t predict.

Your Assignment

Pick the piece you've been tweaking for months. The one that's "almost ready."

Stop.

It's ready now.

Identify 6-7 places it can explode.

Upload it. Submit it. Share it. Email it.

Fulminate it.

Then start the next piece.

Because here's the truth: You're not failing when you hear crickets. You're systematically covering territory. Increasing your luck surface area.

The only way to guarantee failure is to stop searching before you find it.

Remember Walter White's bag of fulminated mercury?

Your music is that bag.

With a little tweak of chemistry, a little strategic thinking about WHERE it goes, one piece can cause multiple explosions.

You're not working harder. You're working smarter.

And so take some action today and don’t ever forget…

The world waits for your music...

-Luke

P.S. - This was a shortened excerpt from my new book 'The Composer's Block Cure.' 

If you want the full system that can help you finish more music and ENJOY yourself during the process:

Grab a copy here

At Tortured Composer's Society, it's our mission to create and provide a community that helps you live a more creative and fulfilling life as a composer. When Tortured Composer's Society was established in 1685 (or thereabouts), we wanted to make the community an inclusive, welcoming table where everyone can come to overcome their creative blocks and thrive as composers.

We believe that every composer, from the bedroom producer to the concert hall maven, deserves a place to explore their craft without judgment. Our community understands the unique challenges of staring at blank manuscript paper at 3 AM, the peculiar torture of hearing a melody in your head that refuses to translate to the page, and the specific type of existential crisis that comes from comparing your work to Bach's while eating cold pizza in your pajamas.

We will always aim to get better at what we do every single day. This means constantly refining our understanding of what makes composers tick, what makes them stuck, and what makes them suddenly breakthrough at the most unexpected moments. We study the patterns of creativity, the psychology of artistic blocks, and the practical realities of making music in a world that often doesn't understand why you need absolute silence to hear the French horn line in your head.

In addition, our primary focus is on our relationship with you. This isn't about broadcasting generic advice into the void. It's about understanding the specific flavors of torture that each composer experiences. Some of you are tortured by perfectionism. Others by comparison. Still others by the haunting suspicion that maybe you should have become an accountant like your mother suggested. We see you. We understand you. We're here for all of it.

This way, every time you hang out with us, you end up getting an idea that takes your compositions to the next level. Sometimes that idea is a technical solution to a thorny orchestration problem. Sometimes it's permission to write something terrible. Sometimes it's just knowing that someone else out there also had to Google "what note is the open G string on a violin" for the hundredth time.

We particularly appreciate when our following provides feedback via testimonials, reviews, and comments left on our site or social media accounts. Your stories of breakthrough moments, creative disasters, and everything in between help shape our understanding of the composer's journey. When you tell us about the time you accidentally wrote a fugue in your sleep, or when you finally understood what secondary dominants were after years of confusion, these stories become part of our collective knowledge base.

Because with that feedback, we can use it to make your next newsletter even better than the last. We're constantly refining our approach based on what resonates with you. Did a particular analogy finally make modal interchange click? Did a creative exercise unlock something you'd been struggling with for months? We want to know about it.

Since we put so much effort into the relationship with you, we hope that any investment in us is exactly the way you hoped it would be. Whether that investment is your time reading these emails, your emotional investment in trying our exercises, or eventually perhaps joining our community in a more formal way, we take that trust seriously.

Because by choosing to go with Tortured Composer's Society, it's our promise that we provide a community you will fall in love with over and over again. A place where your creative struggles are understood, where your small victories are celebrated, and where someone will always understand why you're excited about discovering a new chord voicing.

Now, as much as we care about making the world more musical and more creative, we also care about your privacy. In an age where every click is tracked and every preference is monetized, we believe your creative journey should remain yours. We're committed to the right to your privacy and strive to provide a safe and secure user experience.

Our Privacy Policy explains how we collect, store and use personal information, provided by you on our website. We don't sell your information to companies who want to market sample libraries to you (though honestly, you probably already have too many). We don't share your struggles with perfectionism with companies selling meditation apps. Your creative journey is your own, and we're simply honored to be a small part of it.

It also explains important information that ensures we won't abuse the information that you provide to us in good faith. When you tell us about your compositional challenges, your victories, your preferred DAW, or your secret love of parallel fifths, that information stays with us.

By accessing and using our website, you can trust that what you want to be kept private, will be kept private. Your unfinished symphonies, your experimental phase with serialism, that time you tried to write a rap opera—all of it remains confidential.

If at any time, you would like to read our Privacy Policy and get a better understanding of your rights and liabilities under the law, feel free to visit our site, find the privacy policy in the footer and read it. It's written in plain English, not legalese, because we believe you should actually understand what you're agreeing to.

If there is something you are concerned about or wish to get more clarity on, please let us know by contacting us at [email protected]. Whether it's a privacy concern, a creative question, or just wanting to share your latest compositional triumph, we're here for it.

The Privacy Policy also informs you of how to notify us to stop using your personal information. If you decide that our particular brand of compositional torture isn't for you, we make it easy to step away. No hard feelings. The world of music is vast, and everyone must find their own path through it.

If you wish to view our official policies, please visit our website TorturedComposers.com. There you'll find not just policies, but resources, exercises, and a growing collection of stories from composers just like you who are navigating the beautiful, terrible, wonderful world of music creation.

Remember, composing is not just about the notes you write. It's about the journey of becoming someone who writes those notes. Every struggle, every breakthrough, every moment of doubt and every moment of clarity—they're all part of the process. We're here to make that process a little less lonely and a lot more fun.

The world waits for your music, but there's no rush. Take your time. Make mistakes. Write garbage. Write gold. Write everything in between. We'll be here for all of it.