Earlier this year, Uproxx launched The SOUND+VISION Awards, a first-of-its-kind celebration of creative direction designed to bring our audience closer to the visionary collaborators who empower artists and help drive music culture forward.
On September 22, 2024, we’ll host creative directors, stars, and storytellers at our first IRL awards ceremony. The event will be held at will.i.am’s FYI Campus in Hollywood. Hosted by comedian/musician Reggie Watts with musical performances by J. Rocc and Isaiah Collier, the event will feature a star-studded list of attendees and presenters.
Honorees include:
Tino Schaedler creative director for Travis Scott, Andre 3000, and SAULT.
Adrian Martinez, creative director for Bad Bunny and 6lack.
Tyler, The Creator’s headline performance at Camp Flog Gnaw.
ODESZA’s live show lead, Sean Kusanagi.
Eric Haze – the designer behind some of the most revered logos in music history – is being given the Lifetime Achievement Award.
“This award show is core to what Uproxx is all about as a brand,” says CEO Jarret Myer. “It lives at the intersection of design, culture, music, and lifestyle.”
Uproxx is partnering with Hennessy for the event, with bespoke cocktails planned for both the brunch and event portions of the day. Oysters and caviar will be served, along with a range of small plates, created by the culinary design studio AnanasAnanas.
If you didn’t get the elusive invite, fear not – Uproxx will share photos by Indie Sleaze icon ToastyCakes next week, along with recipes for the bespoke Hennesey cocktails featured throughout the event.
Hip-hop’s global importance is often talked about, but what often goes overlooked in those discussions is just how integral photography has been to its rise — and its continued authenticity as a culture. It’s so hard for hip-hop to be completely co-opted or corporatized because its rise has been documented so heavily by those within it.
Take Sagan Lockhart, for instance. Once a humble apparel salesman in Los Angeles’ fabled fashion district, Fairfax, Lockhart’s interest in photography led to him becoming the unofficial photographer for Odd Future as they rose to stardom, terrorizing local skate shops and sending parents clutching for their pearls. Now, the group’s members have Grammys (Tyler The Creator has a Best Rap Album award for each of his last two albums) and could potentially be adding Emmys to their prestigious collections (former member Lionel Boyce is up for an Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series award for The Bear).
With all that success ahead of them, though, there’s no better time to look back at their beginnings — which is what Lockhart’s first book, I Don’t Play does. After hosting a jam-packed launch party sponsored by Zig-Zag rolling papers brand, Lockhart jumped on a Zoom call with Uproxx to break down the process for his book, the LA underground’s skate shop epicenter, and what it means to have captured history in the making.
What made you want to put out a photo book now, and what went into specifically using Odd Future stuff for it?
It was just a project that a lot of people had been asking for over the years. Some friends of mine started a publishing company, and the way that they presented it to me just made it seem pretty seamless and easy for me to get done finally after all these years, so I was like, “Yeah, sure, let’s do it.” I was kind of just expecting to just make 10 copies, but it went a little bit crazier than that.
I started taking photos probably around ’09, 2010, and that’s when I was working on Fairfax and all the Odd Future stuff was going on, so I kind of just learned how to take photos with them as a lot of the first subjects. It wasn’t this intentional thing of making this book around Odd Future. It’s just that a lot of my earlier photos from this time period that I was showcasing in there just happens to be a lot of them. There’s other experiences and places and people that I wanted to show in the book that I was also shooting, and all of that is in there, but from 2010 to 2013, which is the bulk of the book, there was a lot of Odd Future stuff going on. It wasn’t like this intentional, “Let’s make an Odd Future book.” That’s just what life was at the time.
What did you take away from the launch party?
If one person comes to something that I’m doing, it’s just a reminder that like, “Okay, I’m doing something cool,” but when hundreds of people come to your thing? I was just overwhelmed with gratitude, and to have the support from my friends and new friends, and the event space, and [publicist] Pristina helping out, and especially Zig-Zag supporting the event and coming through with their people. Just super stoked on the way that it turned out, for sure. Definitely super thankful from our sponsors and Zig-Zag for helping out with that.
When did you get interested in photographing or documenting your experiences?
My interest in photography stems from… My godfather was a photographer for Hustler and sh*t like that, so I was always like, “Man, this job was dope. I like what this guy does.”
I’m sure any kid would
When I was younger, I think every young skateboarder, you want to be a professional skateboarder, but as I was getting older, and wanting to do other things, and seeing that maybe that route was not a possibility for me, I was already stoked for working for these street wear and skate adjacent brands, but I was like, “Maybe a skate photographer or something would be dope to do.” A friend of mine just gave me this old 35 millimeter camera, and he was like, “Yo, you want to take photos? Just play around with this and just see where you want to go.”
I want to know what timeframe you were going over there at, just out of curiosity?
Probably around the same time, but just in the interest of like, “Oh, I want to get this Hundred shirt and be out.” I was never like, “Let me hang out, let me kick it.” I was a sneaker kid, so that was what I was always trying to get… I was more on Melrose than Fairfax, honestly.
To me, during this time period, Fairfax was a little bit more… Maybe more of a secret. I mean, La Brea had been around forever. Union was the spot we would go to as kids, and then there was Undefeated and Stussy over there, and then Supreme started the new wave on Fairfax, but this is all very pre-internet.
I was working a full-time job over there, so it was like, “I don’t think I would go out of my way to go shoot Fairfax,” but I was there for 40 hours a week, so I didn’t have a choice. It was like, “I guess this is where I’m going to take photos at.” But from the jump, there was already people hanging out. My first gig over there, before I was at Diamond and met the Odd Future guys, I was working at The Hundreds. Dom Kennedy was hanging out every single day. Nas would come in. Nipsey [Hussle] would kick it all the time. There was already just all these characters that I was lucky enough to be around and just talk with, so it was super natural that when I got the camera to just start shooting whoever was around me.
When you look at the photos from that time period, and then you look at how it’s evolved, what’s your overall impression of the changes that have been made, or how things look different and how much things look the same?
When I do look at it, I’m like, “Damn, all these people went on to do really, really great things.” Without them going on to do that with their lives, I don’t think the book would be as impactful, so I guess that’s what I think when I look at it. I’m like, “Damn, Lionel was just chilling with us, but now he’s up for an Emmy in acting.” That was never a thought in my mind at that time period.
There’s some photos in there where it’s, like there’s a couple old Fairfax shops in there where it’s like, “These businesses are just not there, and it’s going to look completely different.” There’s probably some show photos in there where you’re like, “Oh, this looks like the same exact that I see today.” To be a part of something and some music history, even the smallest scale of where I’m at, just super thankful. A lot of these dudes I just grew up idolizing and listening to, and knowing their albums word for word as a kid. To be a part of that in some capacity, like I’m saying, I’m just super thankful for it.
What do you want people to take away from the book, from the documentation of these experiences?
If I had to split it into two things, I would say for the people who were there, or for the fans from around the world who were looking at this under a microscope at that time, I would hope that they look at it and it kind of brings them back to that time period, and just like, “Oh sh*t, I remember this,” or gives them some sort of positive feelings.
Then for the younger crowd of the people who weren’t there, maybe it just shows them maybe what they missed out on. I got people messaging me about this, and they’re 15, 16, and I’m like, “Damn, you were literally born when this stuff was first going on.” So maybe I hope that y’all look at it, and it just shows you this time period that you missed out on just because you were hella young.
They can take from that. They can learn things like, don’t let anyone stop you. Pursue, pursue. Do the thing that sounds crazy, even if everybody calls you crazy. My guy Shake used to complain about Tyler all the time, because Tyler was terrorizing his blog 2DopeBoyz at the time, and he was just like, “Yeah, that kid’s annoying. But man, he’s a genius. He’s so smart.”
I think that the industry needed and still needs a personality that f*cking strong. Because if he wasn’t so intense, he wouldn’t be making those waves worldwide like that. We didn’t need a humble individual at the time. There’s already some of those. We needed something very strong and crazy like that to shake things up.
If you were to ask just about any American anime fan which examples of the medium are among the absolute best, the odds are very high that their answer will include Cowboy Bebop, the groundbreaking 1998 neo-noir space Western that solidified anime’s ascendance in the States. Their reasons will vary, but that just speaks to how universally appealing the show really was, that it hit grad-school cinephiles as hard as it did kids from the hood — kids like myself and Maryland rapper Logic.
I’ve had a few occasions to write about the connections between hip-hop and anime this year, and Logic provides the latest, teaming up with the anime streaming platform Crunchyroll to launch a limited-edition merch collection inspired by Cowboy Bebop and the Bobby Tarantino rapper’s love for it. Logic’s Bebop fandom is nigh legendary; in addition to constantly referencing it in his music, his second studio album, The Incredible True Story, contains narrative skits featuring Steve Blum, who played Cowboy Bebop‘s stray-dog protagonist, Spike Spiegel.
Including such pieces as a varsity jacket, skate deck, and various apparel bearing Logic’s logo and an image of him hanging out with the crew of the titular spaceship, the Crunchyroll collection is an anime and hip-hop fan’s dream come true — literally. Logic and Uproxx connected via Zoom to talk about the collection, Cowboy Bebop‘s lasting resonance, and of course, the eternal debate among anime fans: Subs or dubs?
Talk to me about how the collaboration came together, who approached who, and what’s been your favorite part about the whole process?
It just very organically happened. I don’t even know when it was like, “We’re going to do a line,” but I couldn’t believe it, and the collaboration was wonderful. I got to use my art director with their people, and then obviously, the original artist [Toshihiro Kawamoto], which is wonderful, to draw me in the Bebop crew, which is just like a dream come true. I was this little kid watching this show, and now, I’m this man surrounded by these fictional idols of mine in a real space. Sh*t’s crazy.
The entire process was fun. It was loving. It was kind. It didn’t feel like, “You can’t do this, and you can’t do that,” and blah, blah blah, which a lot of people try to do. That’s why I don’t really do collabs. I don’t do collabs because people suck. And you know who doesn’t suck? Crunchyroll.
What was your Cowboy Bebop story? How did you find it? What drew you to it?
I had these two homies, Robert and Jesse, and they introduced me to Cowboy Bebop when I was 11 years old. I remember the first time that I saw the Cowboy Bebop movie, it was f*cking subbed. I remember watching this anime that they introduced me to and then having to listen to it, I’m like, “Why are they talking Japanese? What the hell?”
My household was riddled with crime and violence and drugs and craziness and gunshots and drug dealers. I learned how to cook crack when I was 12 years old. Cowboy Bebop was my first true escape from all of that. A lot of people, especially in the hood and where I grew up, they are extremely intelligent, very smart, but they get stuck in this cycle of using their smarts for bad. But the only reason that they’re using it for bad is because of the systemic nature of what our country was built upon. I was like, what if I put my wits into something else? So discovering anime was really beautiful because it was my first true introduction to art and what it means to be an artist.
I think it’s funny that you were talking about subs, because that was going to be one of my fun lightning round questions, subs or dubs? It’s like the eternal debate among anime fans.
Dubs, because I’m watching. I’m not f*cking reading. I want to watch. I have so much appreciation for the Japanese versions, and that’s awesome, but I speak English, so I just want to hear this sh*t. I think it takes me out of the experience. Even a lot of foreign films — I love foreign films, but I don’t really watch a lot of them because I’m reading.
What else have you been watching recently? What are you drawn to when it comes to anime?
I always love a good vintage feel. That’s why I think Studio Ghibli is the bomb because it’s like it gives us this truly animated feel, even in this digital era. But that’s because they care. It’s so beautiful. It’s like to really take great pride in everything that you do, and to also take your time, I think is something that’s really special. I mean, if you can knock something out because you can, then do it. But you see that [care] and you feel it.
One Punch Man, Space Dandy, Attack on Titan was fun, but I didn’t finish it. I need to finish it. People have been telling me I should watch Demon Slayer. I haven’t watched that, but a lot of the time when I watch anime, I watch a lot of the classic stuff.
If you were going to do an anime about your life, which studio would you pick to do it?
I’m going to be honest, I don’t really know too much about the studios besides… How do you pronounce it? Ghibli? Ghibli?
They pronounce it Ghibli [with a soft “g,” like “jeans”], we pronounce it Ghibli [with a hard “g,” like “guppy”] because of the way they wrote it. Doesn’t really matter, everyone knows who you’re talking about.
Studio Gangster, that’s who it is. I really love that art style. But I also love, I guess whatever studio did Akira, that sh*t is wild to me.
[Fun fact: Makiko Futaki, one of key animators on Akira, went on to become a lead animator for Studio Ghibli films such as Kiki’s Delivery Service, Princess Mononoke, and Howl’s Moving Castle.]
Logic’s collaboration with Crunchyroll is available for pre-order on Crunchyroll’s store. Check it out here.
The collaborative nature of the music business is critical to its success, but often that collaboration is done in the shadows, outside of the spotlight. The successes are loud; the planning, the building, the making, the doing –- that part can be all too quiet.
While fans may not think much about how and why these things come to life at live shows, that’s all the creative directors at the production company — which was founded in 2010 and has produced shows for everyone from Drake to Taylor Swift — think about. Alex Reardon, — the President of Silent House, creative director on Tyler The Creator’s Coachella set, and inaugural Sound + Vision Award winner for Tyler’s Camp Flog Gnaw performance — explains how he uses his 20 years of experience in creating live shows to pull all the pieces together to make the rapper’s wildest dreams a reality.
“T comes up with the overall, the 30,000-foot view ideas, and then we riff on things,” he says over Zoom a few days before the explosive Coachella performance. “If we are in this world that he is creating, what would that world look like?” That entails a lot of questions of both entertainment value and feasibility — and, in some cases, safety.
“I believe very strongly that a successful production design is not just about aesthetics,” he says. “It’s about aesthetics, logistics, and finance. One of those is fun, and two of them aren’t, but they are all equally important. And all those bars have to be set to exactly the same level.” When those elements are all aligned, the closest thing in the world to magic happens… like flinging Tyler through the air or outfitting him with a literal flamethrower for his Camp Flog Gnaw set a few months ago.
In order to build out a set like Tyler’s, the designers at Silent House first sit with artists and their teams as they spitball about their vision. While that can be highly informed by specificity and attention to detail, like Tyler’s set, it can also mean just getting the artists’ thoughts on what’s going on their lives, as Silent House’s creative director and designer for Doja Cat’s set Parker Genoway says in a separate interview on the same day.
“It all starts with very abstract conversations and a lot of listening,” he elaborates. “I never present anything, even if I am so excited about something and I am like, oh, this is going to be great for her show. I like to sit with her for hours — and Brett [Alan Nelson, Doja Cat’s Creative Director & Stylist] — and just have her download me on where her head is at, and then I start to pick up on certain things, [like] what materials fit into these descriptions that she is talking about.”
With Doja Cat’s set, her inspirations — or preoccupations, maybe — were clear even without knowing the behind-the-scenes process. Having dancers surround her in costumes make of wigs like really jiggy versions of Cousin It from The Addams Family played into fans’ obsession with her recent big chop, while that T-Rex skeleton evoked the titanic proportions reached by the conversation surrounding her bat skeleton tattoo (those dancers, by the way, were choreographed by Parris Goebel, who also coordinates dancers for Rihanna). Rather than telling a story, Doja’s set created a vibe, like a subconscious clash of imagery and ideas in a dream.
“She was always like, ‘I want a dinosaur. I really want a dinosaur,’” Genoway recalls. “And so when we started thinking about, ‘Let us work backwards. What kind of world could this be? Is this prehistoric or is this post-apocalyptic? Has society crumbled?’… I think when I like to create a world, I want layers and I want versatility, and I want to be able to deliver a show that evolves and does not just stay the same the whole time.”
Meanwhile, Tyler’s set plays into an existing world he’s created around his most recent album and his ongoing fascination with nature and the outdoors. For Reardon, making that world seem plausible and real is the key to success. “If the question ‘why’ has been asked and a legitimate answer to ‘why’ has been given, then a big video screen works,” he maintains. “If you’re doing it without intent, there is never a purpose to do anything other than lasers… We add more so it’s believable because you’ve got to sell the thing. Don’t just put a prop there. Make the prop do what the prop would do if it wasn’t a prop.”
Creating these expansive, detailed worlds from scratch can be a time-intensive process, but it’s also one that requires fine-tuned people skills. After all, artists can be both sensitive and fickle. As Reardon says, “Artists may say, ‘I want my stage set to look like an apple.’ And you give them an apple and then they say, ‘I hate apples.’”
“The way to mitigate that is by understanding a couple of things. First of all, anything you create, even if it’s for someone else, has your ego in it. And you have to understand the power of the unobserved ego. If you don’t accept that your ego is part of it, you will not be able to mitigate the effects your ego will try and have on you in that design process. And someone who hasn’t observed their ego, who doesn’t understand the power of it, the negative impact it can have will say, ‘But you said you liked apples and you have to have an apple and I’m going to make…’ No. Next idea. Okay. Don’t like apples? How about whatever palm tree? Banana. Go through the fruit bowl.”
Genoway echoes this sentiment. For him, what makes Silent House distinct as a production company is that “we are extremely practical in our designs. We make doable things. So the logistics of things are heavily considered in our initial design conversations. As much as we like to try to keep it very blue sky, we are from day one considering what can and can not happen, what the parameters are, how many trucks we have, how many buses are there, so we know how many crews.”
In describing the process of building the concepts — starting with concept art, which can be sourced from sources like magazines, design books, and even AI art, to decks of renders created with computer-aided design programs to concept models — Genoway says the process can take months, but that things can be done last-minute, as well, depending on when Silent House is contracted to build a set. The most nerve-wracking aspect for him, though, is knowing that even with rehearsals weeks before, there’s no telling how everything will really work until the night of, when any number of factors can affect the set.
One stunt involving a massive wall of flames that Genoway says has never been done at Coachella before was nearly nixed because of high wind (it went off went out a hitch on Sunday, and looked badass to boot). He also credits the on-the-ground teams for being able to handle problems on the fly, like broken wheels on the scaffolds used in the set — something to which he, like Reardon, credits to Silent House’s experience as one of the few big-name production agencies working at this scale.
But the most important aspect, both directors agree, is their rapport with the artists, whom they both praise as not just creative geniuses but genuinely great people. As Reardon muses, “I don’t know how it became part of our pop culture zeitgeist that diva is used as an accolade. It shouldn’t be. Don’t be the diva. Be the nice person. And [Tyler] is so genuine and considerate and curious and kind and respectful that everybody goes just that bit further because you want to. I’ve been doing this since I was 21, and I’m 58, and I can count on the fingers of one hand how many people that I just think, ‘You are a genuinely good human being. I am very happy to be here. I will work a bit harder. I will have a little bit less sleep’ because he’s worth it in the end.”
Of Doja, Genoway is equally effusive, “She is always moving into a new world, and so it is so exciting and challenging to be able to try to follow her in which direction she is trying to go and make sure that we are supporting her vision and executing it… I am so thankful for our entire crew and for Doja, for her whole management team and everyone just for putting in the work because it is going to pay off.”
That work, done out of the spotlight and away from the cameras for months and months to create a 90-minute moment for both the artists and their fans, may not always get the attention and appreciation it deserves, but the creators at Silent House know it’s worth it. After all, where else can a self-described “weird theater kid” like Genoway or a 38-year touring vet like Reardon get to make not only their own dreams come true, but also those of these talented artists? When the moments being built are all anyone will be walking about for days afterward, the work done in silence can often speak the loudest.
From the whiskey we drink to the music we consume to the photos we engage with on social media, creativity drives culture. So it’s no huge surprise to see the title of “creative director” splashed across the IG bios of everyone to ever hold a camera. But what does it actually mean to be a creative director? And who excels in this field that so many people seem so intrigued by?
It’s as if you almost need a judging body to celebrate leaders in this nebulous creative direction landscape, right? Well… awaywe go!
To celebrate and champion the field of creative direction, Uproxx has joined forces with the Original Creative Agency (OCA) to launch the Sound + Vision Awards. The awards show, coming this winter, will highlight the best in the field — where photography, art, and design intersect with music. Awards will span categories like “Best Album Design,” “Best Festival Show,” and “Best Tour Merch,” among others. It’s a chance to celebrate the minds behind your favorite stage shows, Coachella acts, album covers, gear, and photo campaigns, which are often every bit as evocative as the music they support.
To begin the Sound + Vision rollout, Uproxx and OCA teamed up with Michter’s American Whiskeys to host a kickoff dinner and whiskey tasting. Musical acts Vince Staples, Bonobo, Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs, Jesse Boykins III, Melo-X, and Ric Wilson joined creatives Adrian Martinez, Jesse Lee Stout, Patrick Krause, Julian Gross, Candice Lawler, Tino Schaedler, and more to form a steering committee that will begin the award-nomination process.
As guests arrived, Uproxx’s head sprits writer, Zach Johnston, poured Michter’s elite whiskeys in an atmospheric library while cocktail legend Iain Griffith created a series of unforgettable drinks with various Michter’s expressions, Farmer’s Organic Gin, and Mezcal Los Siete Misterios as building blocks.
Uproxx’s Zach Johnston hosted guests throughout the night in the Michter’s Tasting Library.
The welcome drink, a French 75 riff with a jello shot posing as an ice cube, was tough to top but the highlight of the night was a beeswax-aged old fashioned made with Michter’s US*1 Small Batch Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey. The drink was delivered to guests inside of a wax egg which they then “cracked” over a large ice cube waiting in a rocks glass. It was an impactful moment that Griffith had been plotting for decades and was finally able to pull off for this special evening — a fitting capper to a night based around creativity.
Chef Sophie Dalah, of Sophie’s Table, deftly paired flavors and aesthetics in a series of high concept dishes, creating a bespoke five-course menu that conjured Michter’s whiskey with sly winks. “Corn butter” made with corn husk broth and served with focaccia and scallops swimming in heritage grains both resonated deeply with guests and aligned perfectly with Griffith’s cocktails. The short rib was another standout — it was rich and umami-forward but balanced by delicate five spice and star anise notes. Those who didn’t drink chose from NON non-alcoholic wine and Visitor Beer.
After an explanation of the awards themselves by Uproxx founder Jarret Myer and OCA co-founder Jesse Rogg and a breakdown of the nomination process by Uproxx Editorial Director of Music, Phil Cosores, Johnston shared more Michter’s whiskey pours with the unofficial after-party revelers. Bomberger’s Declaration (the night’s favorite among attendees), Shenk’s Homestead, the iconic 10-year-old rye and bourbon bottles, and the brand-new Toasted Barrel Finish Rye Whiskey were all sampled widely. Seeing that it was an Uproxx bash, naturally the night concluded with some bold attendees stepping up to the mezcal ice luge.