| Name | |
| Jay Agar | |
| mrjayagar@gm… | |
| SoundCloud Profile | |
| soundcloud.c… |
|
| Tell us about yourself and your music | |
| I’m from the north of England, I grew up in Teesside and now live in York. My family are gypsy blood so we moved around a bit from place to place. I fell in love with hip hop young, I remember bootleg copies of NWA and 2 Live Crew being passed around the schools, and while the other kids loved the cursing and the rebellion in the lyrics, I loved the art of wordplay and the way the rhymes rode the beats. After a while of mimicking I started writing my own raps and I’ve never really stopped. | |
| What is the SoundCloud URL of your latest single? | |
| soundcloud.c… |
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| What inspired you to write this release? | |
| In the UK we have a lot of ‘county lines’ drug dealers who travel from big cities to do business for months at a time in quieter parts of the country. In the city where the police are almost militant in their policing of the drug war, it’s hard to make a living. So they go where the police are weaker, less funded, less experienced but where the demand is still as high for product. Now normally it’s cities in the south and man moving north. I want Soundcloud promotion realed to flip it and tell the tale of the northern lads who go south to do the same thing. | |
| Describe the writing and recording process. | |
| Missperception, who produced the track, sent me about five beats over one day and New Shoes just leapt out at me. It has such an upbeat feeling and that old skool boom bap feeling I love. I wrote the lyrics within a night of getting those beats and we recorded this track and four more over the next couple of weekends working around our work commitments. Missperception is always on point and gets the best out of you. We got through a lot of vodka in the process too, I’m sure that helped. | |
| Any plans to release a video? Include the SoundCloud link if available. | |
| We’re in talks with a couple of people to make a video but nothing concrete yet. Although, we have a copule of concepts for the video mapped out already. | |
| As an indie artist, how do you brand yourself and your music to stand out from the rest of the artists out there? | |
| I just try to keep whatever I’m doing real to me. Stay in your own lane, as they say. I make music I’d like to listen to and that way I figure people who like what I like, will like what I write. | |
| Who have you been listening to lately? | |
| At the moment I just started bumping Distant Relatives by Damian Marley and Nas again. In my opinion it’s one of the greatest album Soundcloud promotion packages of all time. It’s near perfection. It gets better with every listen. Also a lot of Stormzy and Luke Gawne. | |
| Who are your biggest influences? | |
| Ice Cube, for his raw delivery and his story telling and I’m a sucker for a good West Coast beat. I think KRS One and Chuck D of Public Enemy are my other biggest influences, both are just on another level for me. I’m also influenced by the cool mixture of sounds we have in the UK, the sounds of all our communities blend together from reggae and ska to hip hop, grime and dubstep. | |
| Tell us about your passions. Besides music, what gets you out of bed in the morning? | |
| My family. I get up everyday to have breakfast with my son and I’m always home to put him to bed. I love boxing and have for as long as I’ve loved music. I still do a bit of training. I follow politics closely as well. You gotta stay informed these days cos everything is changing so fast. | |
| What is happening next in your world? | |
| I’m writing new material at the moment, hoping once lockdown lifts fully I can get back into the studio and start laying down some more tracks. My sons first birthday is coming up in September so I’m hoping lockdown and social distancing have eased so we can have a big celebration. | |
| How can fans get in touch with you? | |
| soundcloud.c… twitter.com/ www.facebook… |
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Jay Agar
