Ill-Advised Records present:

Lofi Hip Hop Magazine

1. First of all, I love the idea. Who’s idea was it to start an online magazine dedicated to lo fi hip hop and how did you go about getting it started?

I’ve always been interested in zines/magazines, and have had the idea of generally making a magazine that distributed a lot of digital content via QR codes for a while now. I had just picked up skateboarding again and renewed my subscription to “Thrasher”, and at the same time was looking at a lot of the cool art and other non-music material popping up on the lofi subreddits, and it all just sort of clicked. I’ve done a bit of editing/layout work in the past and am an artist myself, so it was just a matter of putting the time in to do it.

2. I saw the magazine is 100% free! As a reader that’s awesome and I definitely appreciate what you’re doing, but from a business point of view I’m curious as to how you’re able to make this happen and what your plans are for the magazine in the future?

As far as the business side of things go, Ill-Advised Records is not really designed to be a self-sustaining business as much as it’s an outlet for the things I’d like to see more of in the lofi community – whether that’s cassettes, magazines, clothing, etc. We don’t tend to think of things in terms of making enough money, as it really is a passion project. When I was deciding how to source the content, I had to make a choice between making it an open-submission type thing and offer it for free (since we wouldn’t want to profit off of free submissions), or charging for the magazine and paying artists for content. I think if we went with the latter, we wouldn’t have had the budget for much content to begin with, and would have ended up making even more of the material in-house. It also wouldn’t have been possible to distribute nearly as many copies. We definitely benefit just from having people take notice of our label and visit our website, and that’s good enough for us. In the future, we would like to pay artists for some specific content and still keep the magazine free regardless. This is meant to be a platform for content creators more than a product.

3. I’ve got to mention the artwork… I’m a sucker for aesthetically pleasing covers whether that’s music, books or magazines and your magazine looks dope. How did you go about deciding the look and feel of your first issue?

The first rule I came up with as far as style goes was “No rules”, haha. The style is all-over-the-place, and I think that works perfectly for this kind of magazine. The lofi community is super diverse, and there is a ton of different art and music coming out now. I didn’t want to fall into any genre cliches with this. Our primary objective as a label is to expand the lofi community and push the boundaries of what is considered “Lofi Hip Hop”, so we wanted to have a really rich range of visual styles to match that. My “real job” is in the art industry (I’m an Administration Manager for an art gallery), and I’ve been an artist for as long as I can remember, so working with visual material and creating my own artwork for the magazine is something I’m very comfortable with. We really base a lot of our layout planning on the submissions. If we get some cool submissions, we’ll bend anything we need to as far as the layout goes to make it work and get it in the magazine.

4. Just looking at the table of contents for issue one of the magazine is crazy, as it covers everything from beat tapes to drum kits and even covers things like Top 10 Anime GIFS and VST Plugins. Clearly, you’ve put a lot of time and effort into creating this magazine. Do you find it requires a lot of time management creating articles whilst running a record label? How do you manage that?

Well, a global pandemic certainly helps free up some time, haha. I normally work my regular job 6 days a week, and fit in the work on label projects in between that, so it can be a bit rough to create content for the magazine while also putting it together and handling the submissions. This is a 62 page magazine, and it took about half a year to put together. Now that we have a lot of the basic layout stuff handled, the next issue should be much quicker to put together. I’m the sort of person who’s idea of a hobby is just more work, so I’ve had a blast through the whole process. I really can’t understate how important all of the community submissions have been for putting this together, as they are the only reason this magazine exists. Creating all of the content in-house just wouldn’t have been realistic, and the magazine wouldn’t have been as diverse and interesting. 

5. The ‘How to Mix Lo Fi Hip Hop’ article was really interesting. I could’ve used an article like this when I started making beats. It was clear and concise. Will tips and tricks for making beats be a regular feature in the magazine? What else have you got planned for content in the future?

That’s the main thing I tend to think of when I write an article, as there are a lot of things I know now which I just couldn’t find a clear answer to back when I was a new producer. The VST list is a good example, as you can find a million lists of the same 5 VSTs for lofi, but as far as really having a description of what they can do for a lofi track specifically, there isn’t much. I also tried to include some that not many people would know about. The mixing guide was something that we had some requests for when I was posting on reddit about the magazine. Someone asked for a guide on how to mix drums for lofi, so I figured I’d do one better and make a guide for the entire track from the ground-up. We’ll definitely be showcasing more material like that in future issues, and in fact I would like to increase the amount of producer-specific content. As far as other planned content goes, we definitely want to include some raffle-type contest in the next issue so that we can give away some cool stuff to the folks who’ve supported us, and we want to get a little more technical with our producer interviews. 

6. This magazine is part of the record label, ‘ill-advised’, right? Can you tell us more about the label itself? Which artists do you currently have on the label? What do you look for in artists and their music, and what ‘ill- advice’ do you have for up and coming artists looking to get signed? (The pun was just sitting there).

Ill-Advised Records was born out of a need for more lofi-specific label representation. Right now, if you want to pick up some physical tapes or merch to support lofi artists, there aren’t a ton of options. I’ve always had a personal motto of “be what you want to see more of”, and the label was created to add another outlet for creators. The first year of our life has been spent juist getting our name out there and setting up our website, gathering a social media following, and putting out tapes for the two artists currently signed (Dated, which is me, and WAYVEE). Now that we have this magazine finished, we’re wrapping up the last few details before we can start really signing more artists and releasing a lot more material. Now is the best time to shoot us some submissions, as we’ll be looking for a number of new artists soon. As far as advice goes for those looking for label representation, I would say just try to be unique. Some main factors we look for are artists with a unique sound (and visual style), a clear willingness to promote themselves (on social, YT, etc), and a good personality. People sometimes think of labels as being a hype-machine that exists to lift up artists, but the relationship is really a more symbiotic one. A label will rarely be interested in an artist with no following, as the idea is for the label to bring new followers to the artist, and for the artist to bring new followers to the label. This is especially true for smaller indie labels, so any artist out there should be on the grind, trying to build themselves up as much as they can so that a label can see that they are dedicated to their craft.

7. Lastly, where can all the low fidelity people out there find ‘ill-advised’ and the magazine?

Our official website is www.illadvisedrecords.com. You can find the magazine there as well as our submissions page to get involved with either the magazine or the label itself.

Echo World Vol 1: An interview with Saul Bell

I was sat in my car thinking something along the lines of, ‘wouldn’t it be cool if there was a place nearby for beat makers to jam…’ when an hour later, Facebook had read my thoughts and recommended an event that may interest me. On this occasion I really appreciated the telepathic powers of Facebook’s algorithms because not only did the event interest me, but it was exactly what I had been looking for.

I’d heard of ‘Echo World’ around the online communities but never really looked into what events they were involved in. Turns out, they’re involved in quite a lot and all local to where I live – ideal. 

I attended my first ‘Echo World’ event named ‘Beat Social’ in Bristol, UK. The idea was an open mic type of session for beatmakers to play their beats. Whilst there, as well as having the opportunity to showcase some of my beats, I also got to meet Saul Bell who happened to be the head of ‘Echo World’ operations. The set he was playing was from ‘Echo World’s’ first compilation tape: Echo World Vol 1, which is now available on Spotify and Bandcamp.

Immediately I was hooked by the level of talent and smooth beats on offer and decided that ‘Echo World’ was something I needed to know more about.

Keep reading to find out what Saul had to say about the label, the events, the music and the beat scene in general…

How and why did ‘Echo World’ the label and brand come into existence?

At the start, I think there was just a real drive to challenge the way we do live music events in the UK, as well as a vision of what would be fun to do at a live music event instead of just standing and watching. It sounds strange, but after we spoke about it, probably for an hour, we felt really inspired to start solving this problem ourselves… and we started working on an event literally the next day! I personally felt that we were in the right place at the right time and that if we had Facebook and a phone, we could do this no problem if we work together. Echo originally was all being organised online, as myself and the other founder, Will, were at university in different cities. We launched in 2018 and have been working at it every day since!

What’s your vision and goal for ‘Echo World’ in the future, both musically and as a label?

My goal over the next few years is to make Echo a centre-point for online beat culture. I’m personally really motivated by the idea that online music communities are full of amazingly talented and inspiring artists, but the ‘echo chamber’ of closed social networks within social media is making it more and more difficult to connect with other artists and find new types of events. If we can bring this musical talent out of the digital world and to a real-life audience, whilst showcasing it in a way that redefines what it means to go to a gig / show, then this is healthy for the music scene whilst also being interactive and exciting for our audiences too. For the label it’s ensuring that artists are treated with the respect they deserve, both professionally and financially, and offering them much more than a service that uploads their tracks to Spotify / Soundcloud. We want our artists to look forward to international events, live streams, press opportunities like interviews and playlists, physical releases and anything else they want in-between. We treat our artists like a customer and not just another MP3 file that’s scheduled to release.

How do you view beat culture and the scene at the moment both locally and globally?

I love all the people I’ve met so far through the beat scene, both in person and online. Locally, promoting hip-hop can sometimes be tough… Bristol has a world-renowned music scene but hip-hop generally gets overlooked because its mainly an experimental & dance music scene. So, it’s difficult in that respect, but when you do find producers or MCs they are incredibly talented, and the people who come to the events really know their music too. Globally I feel as if it’s very fragmented community, as it’s scattered all over countries and continents, and I think the ‘producer’ personality is generally quieter and more cautious socially than others. It doesn’t help that when you met someone in person for the first time after listening to their tracks, it can be pretty strange… Like maybe they have a song you listen to every day and all of a sudden, they say ‘hey!’ at the bar and introduce themselves. That can be a weird few moments! After you get over that though, you do feel a real connection with them, and I think that’s because ultimately you share the same goals and vision for your work; and that’s the most special thing I’ve found whilst doing this. Groups like lofi.family and more beats > less sleep have really helped solidify a ‘community’ feeling across the scene and are great for bringing people together. I’m a strong believer in collaboration being more important than competition and that’s something I think that these online communities are unrivalled at promoting.

How long have you been hosting events in the UK for and whose idea was it to get it started?

I’ve been hosting events for about 6 years under lots of different projects. I had a rough idea of what was needed from DJ’ing, which I’ve been doing since I was in middle school, but it was a steep learning curve still! When I moved to Bristol I had a few really creative friends who were making music or clothing or painting, and it just happened one day that someone asked me to help with a new club night they were starting. I loved how fast-paced it all was and also how rewarding it felt when people had a really good night out, so really, I found a love for it there and used everything I learnt doing this and at university to start Echo!

How did you go about selecting the tracks for the latest compilation? Was there a particular sound or ‘vibe’ you were looking for?

I think a lot of the artists who we approached for the tape kinda knew what kind of sound we liked from submitting / listening to our 1020 and Keakie Music radio shows. We spent a lot of time planning the artwork and the timeline of it all, administrative stuff, and strangely picking the tracks was the easiest part! To be honest, we’re still in a state of disbelief now it’s finished… the sampling, the production, even just the artists that wanted to be a part of it… They are all genuinely some of our favourite artists, so it’s a real honour that they wanted to work with us. When we first listened to the album from start to finish, it was quite emotional to be honest, because it reminded us of all the great experiences we’ve had over the past year that these tracks have been a huge part of. I think bringing together artists from so many different countries, who all think differently, is a real personal goal of all of ours as well. We couldn’t be prouder of the finished product and we hope you all enjoy it too!