Jono, Ben & Megan - The Podcast - Joel Little on Working with Lorde, Taylor Swift & Imagine Dragons

Episode Date: November 13, 2025

Grammy-winning producer Joel Little joins us to talk about his incredible journey that led him to work with global superstars like Lorde, Taylor Swift, and Imagine Dragons. Joel shares behind-the-scenes stories from the studio, the pressure after “Royals,” and why some songs never see the light of day.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Thanks to Hello Fresh Cookies, he delicious dinners, the whole family will love because nothing beats dinner time. Thanks for having me. Now, if people don't know about Big Fan, that's something that you started with your wife, what is it?

Big Fan is a, I would call it a world-class recording and, like, recording studio and venue, a multi-purpose facility in Morningside in Auckland. Yeah, and my wife and I built it with the sole purpose of just trying to give people more access to spaces like that to be able to upskirts.

and further their careers in music or even just explore their passion for music. You actually, we always say, oh, we give back to the industry. We haven't given anything back to our industry. You're actually giving back to the industry. I know that's not true for you guys. But yeah, and I think a lot of people actually don't know

that it's a charity. So a lot of the, I mean, all of the money that we make from anything from like somebody buying a beer at the bar or like someone hiring one of the studios that all just goes back into the free programs that we put on there. It must be cool for you. Like, you know, you've done these amazing things, and you still continue to do that, but to give back and to see the next generation. I mean, you don't want them to get too good.

I keep saying that to my daughter's, you know. But, you know, it must be kind of cool to get back. Yeah, I don't want too much competition. So right now there's a bit of a fundraising drive at the moment that you're matching dollar for dollar, right? Yeah, it's the first time we've ever done a fundraiser. We've put on, so far we've put on free programs without sort of reaching out to donors and things. But we just want to be able to do more. We're running a fundraiser at the moment.

you can go to bigfan.com. I feel like we've done a lot. We've been around three years and we've done a bunch but we're just trying to do more. We just want to do as much as we possibly can. You should just start charging for stuff, mate.

I think that's our main problem. We don't know much about business but I feel like, man, enough, that's a little bit of you. It's great, it's an awesome thing you're doing. It's so good. It's our main problem. Joel, little with us.

You've been busy, mate, on the producing front? Yeah, I've been. I have been. I mean, I'm like back to L.A. next week. I've been doing stuff with a bunch of different people, but I'm also just enjoying being here. You know, there are times you can say, and there are other times you can't say, right, I imagine.

Yeah, there's a few things in the pipeline. I mean, it's a funny business because you do all this stuff and then you work with some big artists and sometimes the songs come out and sometimes they don't, so you don't love to talk about it in case it doesn't like that doesn't happen. So there's a few things like that. But recently I've had, like, I've got a new song out with Rita Orra, been doing a few things with her.

And then some newer artists who have just been signed over there who are really cool. So, yeah, there'll be some things coming out. But I love being in New Zealand. and just like artists come through here on tour and I'll work with them but a lot of the stuff still out of ballet because that's what we were saying recently is like a lot of big artists were recording in New Zealand and maybe we don't even know yeah there's a bit of that I mean a lot of the time they're also just on tour and they're exhausted so they're not like they don't

have a lot of energy for that but then there's other people who will stick around for like a few days a lot of people end their tours in New Zealand so I'm always like hang out for a few days and like we'll write and I know because it blows your mind when you look at artists and I know you have worked with Taylor Swift and stuff. I mean, she felt like she was on tour for so long. And then she brings out an album, you know? When did she have time to do that? I know.

I mean, she's just a whole other level. That's, yeah, she's just, yeah, a freak. Yeah, and the best possible, in the best possible way. Yeah, I mean, she blows my mind. It's crazy. I don't know how she does it. It's like take a break, you know? But she's like churning out in albums and songs.

Endless energy and always inspired. Yeah, it's crazy. Yeah. So would she, would you just sit in there for like 12 hours of time with her, just churning them out? Not even that. I mean, it was faster than that with her because she's so good at it. And she always comes in with lots of ideas.

And so it's usually pretty quick. Like, I mean, it'd be like a normal eight hour day. You're not doing anything too crazy. But then I'll just go and tinker on the production afterwards. But yeah, I mean, she's, yeah, that was so much fun. Is there anyone you've been nervous to work with? You seem a pretty level-headed person. Yeah.

The person that was honestly most nervous to work with because of my, my early pop-punk days and Good Night Nurse was Mark Hoppers from Blink 1182. Oh, yeah. Even just meeting him, he was the one person where I was like, oh man. Fanboy. Did you play him, Good Night Nurse? No, I told him about it, but I was like, I don't want you to listen to this. Then you'll hear how much we ripped off your songs.

You could be a court case. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I don't want to get sued. Is there anyone you've recorded with that you did play, did you play Taylor Good Night Ness? No, I don't, I think I just leave that part of the story out. Why? We love that. He's just like, I'm a Grammy Award winning producer. Once I've got to know them a little bit more, I can.

play them some good night nurse but can you listen to your own music without picking a little nitpicky things that you wanted to improve on i can if they just it just needs to have a bit of space between like if it's a really recent one then no i'll always hear those little things but there's definitely times where like one of my songs will come on on the supermarket or something and i'll be like what is that i'm like oh i made that one that's so cool which is yeah which is cool yeah because i mean i've done probably hundreds of songs over the years so it's just like yeah there's certain ones that i'm like who is like what are you just trying to like that's bloody good it was me that was me is there one song that you're really proud of like

one really stand out you're like damn that's good i don't know i mean obviously i still feel like the stuff i did with lord is pretty like it will always be pretty special and yeah ros and just so like life-changing as well like that whole that whole process of just no expectation and then it becoming this thing was like there was a lot of freedom making those songs because we just weren't thinking about any of that stuff and then you know once you have success the expectation is uh yeah how yeah like I mean how was it doing the field I don't know what artist you worked with straight after Lord and your Grammy like yeah who did you work with then I was straight into broods after that actually did you feel a lot of pressure on that record uh I feel like I was then I was like kind of

flying high on the confidence of like doing this new thing that everyone was into and so I just had fun with that. I mean, from when I did the Lord stuff to like, to when I actually had more like big mainstream success, which was like Khalid and Imagine Dragons and stuff, that was like three years. So I did like three years of no more hits and then suddenly had some other big song. So I just was like, I'm just going to keep going, keep doing the thing that I, that I love to do and like just see what happens. And eventually it kind of like, you know, another song clicks into place for people and becomes big. And yeah, it's such a weird business because you just don't know it's going to take away. Well, you said, you know, at the beginning of this, you record

so many songs, so many don't get released. Like, on a percentage-wise, of the amount of songs that are recorded with major artists, how many of them wouldn't ever see the light of day? Oh, man. I mean, some of those guys are writing, like, 100 songs for an album, and then, you know, 12 of them are on the record. So you record 100? Yeah, I mean, yeah, you'll record it to, like, up to a point, yeah. Oh, my God. Or they'll record it with multiple different people that they're writing with, and then... Fascinating. When you're, so we could talk to you for hours. Yeah, sorry, you're like, yeah. When you're, yeah. When you're you're recording for example the lord album and you're doing royals are you sitting there going

this is huge no i don't know i think the the songs that i've had that have been big i've kind of had a feeling that there was something about them that was kind of special but um not you just there's so many factors that come into play like timing and um you know it could be like a radio programmer is in a bad mood that dan is like no i don't like this one and then like you know just kind of stalls like there can be lots of different things that that that kind of that get in the way so there was more just a feeling that the song is special and then you just

kind of organically has to like have a lot of other things fall into place as well yeah right well we want to play speaking of your music we've got a little game it's called second take we play like a split second of a song you've produced and you've got to try and figure out which one it is you'll nail this too Megan actually did quite well beforehand we were playing it

so yeah okay I got all of them don't mean to brag but you know here's the first one that is royals yeah it's really hard too we try to go even shorter I feel like I did this last time

and I got what was like the starts of the songs maybe I said you I think we've played this game with you before but yeah and then we were like I don't know but anyway you won't remember I didn't make it to year it was like one of your things you recorded

and it didn't make it to year so yeah we just keep recording the same album All right, here's the second one. Joel Little, second take. Oh, that's, you need to calm down. Oh, my God. Wow. You just know for that one hit.

Yeah. You need to calm down. I spend so much time with these songs. Yeah. Okay, this is the third one. It's hard when they're kind of singing at the same time. Yeah, play it again, play again. I want to say that's Imagine Dragons.

Wow, you're good, you're good. And we made the game harder than last time. I think it was harder than last time. Yeah, good. Here's the fourth one. Second take with Joel Little. Oh, you know what? That's so funny that I know what that is, but that's Bridges by Brutes.

Yeah. Far out. Was it funny that you know that? I mean, just that that was like the weirdest snippet of the song. Okay, now this is the last one for you, mate. Oh, okay. This is tough. I think we shorned it from your version, Megan.

Oh, I don't know if I know what that is. But it just sounds like noise. Could be anything. Yeah. Well, it is. Yeah, that was probably too tough. We did you dirty on that one. You know why?

Because I didn't produce that song. I co-wrote it. But that was Jack Antenov that produced. Oh, okay. Well, there you go. Shouldn't get your bloody Jack in him play that? Oh, there you go. That's why you wouldn't have got that.

I didn't spend as much time with the song. Last thing in my face, yeah. Well, Big Fan, a wonderful thing you're doing, giving back to creatives in the music industry. I want to get their start as well. How can they help out? People listening right now that want to donate. Anyone that wants to help out and donate, you just go to Bigfan.com to NZ. It's right there.

And even if you can't donate, just spreading the word, telling people about Big Fam. And, yeah, just anything like that helps as well. So whatever you can do is much appreciated. Donations, text, deductible. Oh, yeah, true. That's true. That's true. Thank you, Megan.

And matched by a million jammer as well. After $50,000, which is incredible. So well done on giving back and it's lovely to hang out with you again. Yeah, likewise. Thanks, guys.