Creating the Pixelhaze Theme – Kieran Williams Sound Design

Why This Matters

Take a moment. Picture your latest web design course, hours in the making, every lesson fine-tuned, each pixel agonised over. You press play on your first module and realize: that bland, canned stock music chirping away in the background flattens your playful pixel art into a forgettable PowerPoint. The art looks luminous. The music, however, sounds like a lift. That kills mood and motivation, and it doesn’t fit the brand you’ve spent weeks defining.

If you teach, coach, or release creative content, you know the right soundtrack doesn’t simply “fill silence.” It can make the difference between students drift-clicking away or being drawn in, wanting to learn more. Yet great music, especially music that actually gels with animated tutorials, bright retro graphics, and playful branding, can be as elusive as a left-handed screwdriver. Buy-in matters. Energy counts. Playfulness is non-negotiable.

This was exactly the wall we hit on Video One of the Pixelhaze Webdesign Blueprint series. The tutorials looked sharp, but were missing their audio soul. Kieran Williams stepped in to create a theme track that would become the audio backbone of the entire Academy experience. If you’ve ever felt lost, frustrated, or simply baffled about how to make music for this kind of project, you’re not alone. Here’s how we tackled it, and how you can too.

Common Pitfalls

If you’ve dipped a toe into sourcing or making music for creative content, you’ll probably recognise these mistakes:

1. Slapping on Generic Background Tunes
We’ve all been there: downloading a royalty-free track, crossing fingers it doesn’t turn up in a toothpaste advert. The result? A disconnect. Your lessons feel tacked together, your brand’s personality is nowhere to be seen, and students notice (even if they can’t articulate why they’re bored).

2. Overcomplicating the Soundscape
It’s tempting to cram in fancy synthesiser arpeggios, dramatic drum fills, or whatever plugin came free last month. But with busy visuals, piling on audio detail drowns out your key messages. Complexity is not the same as quality, especially for tutorial content.

3. Ignoring Theme and Tone
Pick a moody jazz loop for a bouncy pixel animation, and suddenly your cheery branding sounds like a late-night detective series. Not ideal. If the music and visuals don’t match, the whole experience feels jarring.

4. Getting Lost in Gear and Tech
There are more DAWs and plugins out there than there are varieties of instant noodles. Newcomers often get so bogged down in studio tech that composition takes a back seat. This leads to half-finished ideas and a desktop full of unused samples.

Kieran faced every one of these challenges. Through trial, error, and a bit of musical mischief, he found a process to spin colour and life into the Pixelhaze sound.

Step-by-Step Fix

1. Nail Down the Real Brief (Don’t Just Guess)

The starting point isn’t a chord or a clever plugin. It’s clarity: What story does your soundtrack need to tell?

For Pixelhaze, our brief bounced between three magnets: energy, retro nostalgia, and playfulness. Each word was chosen for a reason. “Energy”, so lessons would feel alive. “Nostalgia”, to nod to our pixel art and 8-bit roots. “Playfulness”, because education should never taste like cold porridge.

Grab a post-it. Jot down three words that capture YOUR project’s vibe before you touch your DAW. Return to this list at every step. If you veer towards the boring or obvious, it brings you back.

2. Pick Tools For the Job, Not For Tech Bragging Rights

You could spend months reading gear reviews and avoid actually writing a note. Kieran didn’t do that. He’s used Logic Pro X as his DAW for years, simply because he knew it inside out and it’s versatile for everything from synth work to sound design.

The bigger lesson: Start with tools you can use without thinking. If you’re new, free DAWs like GarageBand, Reaper or even BandLab work. If you’re a Logic or Ableton die-hard, go with those. The software is just a pencil; what matters is the drawing.

When composing the Pixelhaze theme, Kieran built his track almost entirely in-the-box, keeping setup simple and focusing on results.

3. Compose With the Visuals in Mind

Now comes the fun part: turning theme words into actual music. Kieran started, not with the melody, but by working out a repeating chord sequence in a major key. The result was bright, reassuring, and instantly reminiscent of old-school games. Simplicity was key. The progression loops throughout to hold things together when students’ focus shifts between the visuals and narration.

Most content creators go for slick drum machines or basic loops. Instead, Kieran turned to the real world for inspiration (and percussion). No snare? No problem. Instead of a snappy drum, he sampled a bin lid. For added rhythm, out came a ticking clock. There’s even a ratchet buried in the mix. This approach kept the mood playful and the rhythm unpredictable, echoing that retro game spirit.

Effects were used sparingly but cleverly. A touch of delay on percussion created intricate patterns that jittered in sync with pixel explosions and on-screen transitions.

4. Build Your Sound Palette Wisely

Every instrument in the Pixelhaze theme was chosen for a reason, and the palette stayed focused. The track’s backbone: a soft synth bassline shaped via side-chaining (where the bass drops out as other elements hit, creating a breathing effect). Kieran kept lead synth textures simple and melodic; the hook was good, but not one that would stick in your head to the point of distraction.

Crucially, everything is mixed to sit behind the voiceover. The music is energetic enough to keep attention, but never so busy it turns the narration into mush.

5. Experiment With “Found Sound” and Sound Design

Using a bin lid or a ticking clock as percussion may seem unusual, but in practice, it can add unique sonic character that’s impossible to replicate with off-the-shelf samples or plugins. Kieran’s years of band gigs, studio experimentation, and music tech study paid off because he listens for rhythm in everything.

He layered these found sounds with effects, taking care to avoid overdoing it. The final mix is playful but never chaotic; every sample is picked to echo the visuals without turning the track into a laboratory of random noises.

6. Build Your Process for the Future

Once the theme was written, recorded, and mixed, Kieran saved his entire DAW session—settings, samples, effects chains, everything. This makes it easy to adapt for future modules: swap a chord, add a motif, adjust the mix.

This is a workflow you should use. Saving project templates and instrument racks lets you keep thematic consistency throughout your content. When your next course or series needs a tweak, you aren’t starting from scratch or relearning your own process.

What Most People Miss

You can tick every technical box: tight chords, punchy percussion, flash effects. The biggest leap comes from matching the music’s personality to your content’s visuals and purpose.

Kieran’s advantage came from looking for ways to weave sound into the Pixelhaze story itself. By using sounds from the real world and limiting himself to a handful of elements, he left space for nostalgia and fun, and avoided drowning the narrative.

The goal isn’t to chase big, cinematic “impressive.” Focus on creating “memorable.” If your viewers catch themselves humming the melody or smiling at a clever effect, you’ve succeeded.

The Bigger Picture

Once you understand music and sound design for one project, a few interesting things happen:

• Consistency becomes easy. Your next set of tutorials, branding animations, or marketing videos will sound and feel like “you,” without random, mismatched stock loops.

• You save time. No more endless trawling for half-decent stock tracks or wrestling with plugins you’ll never use again.

• You signal professionalism. Cohesive, custom audio shows care and attention. Audiences spot the difference.

• You start to play. Each new project becomes an opportunity to experiment. You can use new chord progressions, record field sounds, and try new DAW tricks while staying within your brand.

For Pixelhaze, this approach improved the Academy’s content from just another tutorial series to a genuinely inviting learning experience, one with a personality students want to come back for.

Wrap-Up

Strong educational content deserves a soundtrack that is memorable and enjoyable to listen to. Kieran Williams’s Pixelhaze theme keeps the energy, colour, and warmth of each lesson, making the Academy instantly recognisable and appealing.

The systems here aren’t reserved for classically trained musicians or production pros. Anyone can:

• Identify the mood your content needs
• Use tools you actually know
• Match music to visuals, not just to taste
• Stay ruthlessly simple, playful, and useful

And most importantly, experiment. Make your brand distinct, not just “good enough.” The only thing worse than no music is the wrong music.

Want more helpful systems like this? Join Pixelhaze Academy for free at https://www.pixelhaze.academy/membership.

Behind the Musician

A little about the mind behind the melody: Over the past several years, Kieran Williams has pieced together a studio that feels as much like a workshop as a sanctuary. From adolescent bands and school gigs to a BSc in Sound Engineering, he’s collected everything from battered guitars to a (still unfinished) modular synthesiser. When he’s not recording miscellaneous household items or getting lost in Logic Pro, he’s collaborating with creatives across industries, writing scores for animations, short films, video games, and now, the occasional online academy with a healthy addiction to neon pixels.

If you have questions about sound design, music production, or the finer points of hitting things in time, you can contact Kieran at kieranw.sound.design@gmail.com

Website: Coming soon!

FAQ

What Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) is best for Pixelhaze-style music?
Logic Pro X is Kieran’s preference, but you can use what you know best. GarageBand, Reaper, and Ableton Live are all fine. The important bit is feeling comfortable and not getting lost in menus.

How do I make music more lively with delay effects?
Start by setting a delay timed to the tempo of your track. Apply it only to certain sounds (say, snare samples or found percussion). Listen for repeating echoes that add patter and movement, but make sure it doesn’t muddy the main rhythm.

What are some creative percussion ideas?
Try bin lids, glasses, kitchen counters, hand claps—anything you can safely hit. Record, trim, and drop them into your project. Unexpected sounds catch attention and stick in the memory.

What’s the minimum studio gear I need?
A decent computer, your DAW of choice, a pair of headphones or monitors, and (if you fancy recording your own samples) a microphone. Kieran’s setup grew over years, but you can start small and build.

Jargon Buster

DAW (Digital Audio Workstation): The main software you use to compose, record, and mix music.

Side-chain: A method where audio from one instrument (often drums) triggers the volume to lower on another (like a bassline), giving a pumping feel.

Want Proof?

Check out the Pixelhaze Academy’s Webdesign Blueprint series for a living, breathing example. Tap in, listen close, and see if you can spot the ticking clock or the phantom bin lid. If it makes you smile, the goal has been met. If it inspires you to whack your own recycling bin with a stick for your own project, you’re in the right place.