Cover Article(Interview)

Lost Boys Interview

‘We got lost, sorry’ Lost Boys frontman Zach says with a smile on his face. I get the feeling

that he’s used that before.

Lost boys are an up and coming hip-­‐hop duo from the UK. Their big break came with their free digitally released free track No Love, which is probably more recognisable to you then Lost Boys. The boys have had a rollercoaster past few months, after the track was launched into the spotlight through twitter, vine, Facebook and eventually found its way on to a Nike advert.

Now, the boys sit in front of me, one massive record deal with Def Jam and meeting Kanye himself later, I have the pleasure of interviewing them.

Regul8r: So, tell me, how are you feeling after the past few months?

Zach: Exhausted, in one word. Honestly, I’m still having a hard time believing these past few months have happened. Ever since we got that call from Rick Rubin. Rick fucking Rubin called me. Can you believe that? I had to get John to hit me to make sure I wasn’t dreaming.

John: Yea, exhausted. As well as excited. There is so many things coming up, I am very excited. I mean, Kanye hugged me. Kanye legit hugged me, if I was to die right here in this interview chair I would be ok with that. I’m a Kanye Stan and I’m not afraid to admit it. (Laughing)

Regul8r: How did you two meet and decide to make music together?

Zach: Nothing too special, to be honest. We were both making our own music and uploading it t sound cloud, you know the sound cloud artists that link their songs to you on twitter (laughs). We both visited the same music foru-­‐uhh, yeah, a forum. We both visited the same music forum and met through there, where we began speaking and sending each other our beats/freestyles/songs to listen to, and to heavily judge (John lets out an embarrassed laugh)

John: Yea, nothing too special. It’s been fun though. Having someone you can talk to and bounce ideas/tracks off is very helpful, especially when it comes to wanting to improve. After a few months of talking and being very critical of each others music (death stare to Zach, then turns back to face me) we met up at an A$AP Rocky concert, unplanned, and decided to rent out a studio the next day just for fun, we certainly didn’t expect to be sitting in front of you as a result

Regul8r: Walk me through what that first studio session together was like

John: Freeing is one word to describe it. And competitive, very competitive. We actually warmed up by rap battling each other as soon as we got to the studio. It’s a great way to get creativity flowing, and your flow all ready to go. We make a point of trying to do that every studio session now; it’s a great way to start. Once we got down to making music though, it was like a trance. Everything just flowed, its like we both knew what the song wanted to sound like most of the time and we went for that. We tried to be as little influenced as possible and make It very barebones and very our own, but that’s pretty ironic considering how heavily influenced our band name is (laughs).

Zach: Working in the studio with John really is something else. We push each other to make the best we can, and we do disagree often on what’s best for the song, which is good because your art being challenged can only make it better. I like to call us UK’s answer to Run The Jewels, but John just calls me a Fuck Boy every time I say that.

Regul8r: There is obviously some serious chemistry when you two get put in a studio. What was the creative process for making ‘No Love’?

Zach: It wasn’t the first full track we made, I’ll say that. Maybe we will release the other ones in 10 years time on the 5th remaster of our debut album and we hate each other. Although were not a 70’s rock band so maybe not. In all seriousness, we wanted something to stand out. Like I said, we had been in the studio plenty of times with each other at this point and already had some songs under our belt. John sat me down and said to me that we needed to get serious, and make some serious that reflects that. So we did. There was probably about 10 different versions of this song towards the finishing of it, we tweaked and fiddled with every tiny thing to try get it as perfect as we could (John jumps in, cutting him off, to which Zach just laughs and listens)

John: It was painful. I cant explain what its like to listen to a few second clip of a song over and over with different versions to make sure its perfect. But I would go into the studio right now and do it all again. Once we finished it, and listened over to it, we both looked at each other and realised that we had made something incredible. It was the first song we were both actually 100% happy with the finial version of.

Regul8r: And now you have a huge record deal with Sony, how did that happen?

John: Well, we had been in talks with some smaller labels before we released No Love. However, we just couldn’t agree to any terms, so we moved on. After the release of No Love and it blowing up, we got a phone call and here we are (laughs)

Regul8r:It seems you have a lot to do then, I look forward to the debut album, thanks for your time Lost Boys

Zach: Thanks for having us, hope to see you again once our debut album is it, if it isn’t a complete flop anyway.

John: Thanks for talking to us, peace.