Leeds Hip Hop Scene

‘We’re called SOL, the album is called Sons Of Light’ says Tom, as he
explains his bands name and the title of their debut album. ‘Sons Of Light’
is a mixture of gospel, r ‘n’ b, with hints of hip-hop beats but overall its
pop music which has a crossover appeal. SOL’s debut album has been a slow
burning success over the past 12 months. Meeting SOL, who comprise of Lanre
Phillip, Tom Gray, and Arinze Phillip (absent from the interview), they’re
passionate about their band, their production company Slickhanded
Productions, and their studio which they’ve put their heart and soul into
building up and making their own over the past 10 years, and are
enthusiastic about pretty much everything that they talk about.

The album’s songs covers a lot of ground, social (‘Gangstaz’ and ‘Ghetto
Prayer’), political and personal (‘Is That Love?’ and ‘Hideaway’), which
with its simple lyrics can be more effective than you realise especially on
repeated listen. But equally the album is suitable for people to put on kick
back and party too as Lanre says ‘we just wanted to make some tracks with
banging beats at the end of the day, do you know what I mean?’
So which came first the singing or producing?
Tom: ‘I suppose the singing came first and then production. The production
side of things came out of writing songs and then wanting to fine tune it
and make them better. These are songs (on their debut album) that we’ve
written over quite a long period of time. We’re also producing for other
people too (as Slickhanded Productions), by day we were doing that and by
night doing the singing and writing.’
Lanre: ‘It’s funny because by the time, from starting it to finishing, by
the time we got to the end of it we learnt so much in that period. With the
songs at some point we had to stop ourselves and say right that’s it.’

How has the reception been so far for the record over here?
Lanre: ‘Yeah brilliant actually, really good. I mean obviously we’re proud
of the record and we thought it was good; we even put all of the CDs in the
cases ourselves. But basically we’ve been doing everything ourselves,
spreading and doing by word of mouth. The best thing is doing something of
quality and then going out on the road and promoting it. And there are
people that are out there that do wanna hear us, and the amount of help and
support that we’ve got a long the way it’s been good.’

Does the album have a crossover appeal?
Tom: ‘I hope so; we certainly planned it that way. We were never intending
to be underground or anything. Basically although we’re making r ‘n’ b, no
matter what the genre be it Death Metal or House music, if it’s a good track
or a good song whatever you’re into you try to make it appeal, and that’s
what we try to do really, rather than just make it for a few people. But the
dream is to sell records and to tell people what we’re about, and you know
we’re already doing it, we’re already selling records.’

Do you have a favourite track on the album?
Lanre: ‘The amount of sweat and tears and effort that went into each
individual track its difficult to be objective about them.’
Tom: ‘I think I’ll pass comment on that one, because if it’s put it black
and white I’ll have changed my mind. But I think my favourites are some of
the new tracks that we’ve done.’

Is the album quite personal then?
Lanre: ‘Yeah some of it is, like ‘Is That Love’ is looking at a couple of
friends of mine and their relationship. I wrote the song about them and I
was locked into that way of thinking of what love actually is, and does it
mean different things to different people.’
Tom: ‘There are personal songs on the album, there’s also songs that look at
society and has a social commentary about them, not that we’re trying to be
preachers or anything, we just wanted to try and raise certain awareness.’

What’s the track ‘Gangstaz’ about?
Lanre: ‘We’ve seen the ‘gangster’ image from America which is kind of a
Hollywood thing.’
Tom: ‘So we can take the glamour aspects of it and think it’s great. It’s
alright for us (grown ups) where we can disassociate that as an image. But
you’ve got kids growing up with that and they can’t disassociate that. I’m
not blaming music for that, because that’s ridiculous.’
Lanre: ‘You know I’m not out to ban it or stop it and I’m not gonna go
protesting when 50 Cent comes to town.’
Tom: ‘But the point is there has to be a ying and yang of it, if there’s that
message then there has to be an alternative one too. I just think there’s
got to be a balance (that’s what the track is trying to address).’

How did your new deal with Avista Urban Records come about?
Lanre: ‘Basically what they’ve done is they’ve signed us for a 2 album deal
in America.’
Tom: ‘The plan is we’re gonna release the same artwork as we did on the
record over here, but with about 4 extra tracks on it. So we’re looking
forward to that as well, for the style of music that we’re doing as well,
cause their just isn’t the sales or market for it over here, and the style
of pop music that we make is bigger over in America.’

Is it different being on a major label? And is getting a major deal more
difficult nowadays?
Tom: ‘A major label needs to have the sound, the image, you’ve gotta have
the video like the whole package before they’ll even entertain looking at
you.’
Lanre: ‘They don’t have to do any work any more really.’
Tom: ‘The point is if you’ve already got a product that’s already there,
that’s of a standard, its very difficult for them to come in and say right
we want you to do this and sound like this, because if they like it they’ll
like it for what it is and who you are already.’

Is there anyone you wanna work with?
Tom: ‘Everyone locally we want to work with, we’ve luckily been able to
already which is good. We’ve just got one of our label mates Tonex, which
we’re chuffed that we’re even on the same label as him, he’s quite an
inspiration for us.’
Lanre: ‘Also Corinne Bailey Rae we’d like to work with too, her success has
been quick but organic, in the old school way, so good on her.’

Do you prefer working in the studio or playing live?
Tom: ‘That’s a good question. Performing live is out first love, but after
that I love the creative aspect of starting a new record. When you’ve got an
idea for a song and hearing the end result and going that’s exactly want I
wanted.’
Lanre: ‘I really thrive of that as well being on stage, and vocally when you
come up with some extra tricks and harmonies and everything is just there,
and the band is pushing us to give a better performance to the music, and we
can be singing and all of a sudden its like yeah man and you turn round and
the drummer and keyboard players are buzzing of the energy that’s really
good, and it’s a feeling that’s hard to beat. We just wanna put out tracks
with a cool message with some uplifting music to party too.’
Ben Bradford.

More Info:
www.myspace.com/sonsoflight