>>farzad: hi everybody we're going to getstarted. thanks so much for coming out.>>will abramson: we should have brought note cards>>farzad: my name's farzad. i'm with the tastemakers team.this is kavon, and – >>kavon: tastemakers team as well.>>farzad: yeah, let's just jump right into it.you guys all know why you're here. in three years the san francisco-based yourstruly has become one of the hottest music video brands on the web.their mission, to discover and document, celebrate and interrogate, capture and catapult thoseartists who without question demand our affection.
in three short years they've produced nearly300 videos. built a number of high-profile partnerships.and in the process have worked with some of the hottest artists in indie music today.just a few right here. ara music, best coast, camera obscura, damfunk, emma, freddy gibbs, grimes, holly miranda, in love, john vanderslice, kurt vile, localnatives, morning benders, night jewel, odd future, pure x, real estate, shabazz palaces,twin sister, unknown mortal orchestra, vetiver, washed out, yellow wolf and zola jesus.so that just leaves off quincy jones, and the xx and you got the entire alphabet there.>>will: they're in collaboration together. [laughter]kavon: so today we are honored to be in conversation
with will abramson.we'll discuss his background. what makes yours truly, truly theirs.how they've grown. the obstacles they've faced. what they're cooking up and what's in storefor the future. plus a little later we'll be hanging out withchris chu who you just saw in that video. of the morning benders, now pop etc. whichyou'll also learn about later. the hangout will be live from brooklyn.we do ask that you stay until the end of the video. we're gonna have two camcorders backthere and we don't want your head popping up. we tried to make… we're gonna make thispart of the tastemakers series. so many of you were here for our first talkfor steven allen.
this is the morning benders and yours truly.and then we'll also be doing 'one on one design' with yves behar.so without further ado please welcome to google will abramson.[applause] >>farzad: alright, well we thought a fittingintroduction for anyone who hasn't seen your videos is a quick reel. this is from the series'in my room' that you guys do with mtv. let's check it out.>> man: it's not for an event really. it's not for money.it's not for like, there's no proper show. it's just; you're just playing your songsagain. [guitar music]it's stripped down.
there's just a group of people sitting aroundyou and you're playing your songs. [guitar music gets louder]>>male singer: [singing] put your dreams away for now.i won't see you for some time. i am lost in my mind.i get lost in my mind. mama once told me.you're already home when you feel love. >>multiple singers: [singing] whoo hooo hooohooo whoo hoooooooooowhoo hoo hoo hoo >>man: those are always the shows that youremember the most. you know, because you get like a genuine audiencereaction.
like you can play on a huge stage and youcan you know have great sound and every ones into it.but then you walk backstage and you never see those people.you don't get any like – >>woman: i think it's also more fun –>>man: feedback. >>woman: because you just don't you're notafraid. [guitar riff]>>woman: and so i'm just gonna go for it and i'm not nervous at all [giggles]>>man: yeah. [single guitar playing]>>multiple singers: [singing] i left first. >>female singer: [singing] because i knewthat this was cursed.
no i never want to see you again.left you hopeless high and dry yeah >>multiple singers: [singing] i moved on.>>female singer: [singing] because i thought that i was strong.i was thinking about myself. >>male: not having it amplified kind of feelslike less official. so you can just kind i have fun—>>female: yeah, totally. >>male: you know.like if it's not amplified all of the sudden, like everything that happens is just—>>female singer: [singing in the background] happening right now.[guitar with background singing] which makes like playing the songs.you know like every time can be its own different
thing.you know it doesn't have to be played the way that it supposedly played which is cool.>>kavon: all right will, where were you born and raised and what did creativity meet yougrowing up? >>will: i was born in new hampshire but igrew up in cupertino. i come from a very musical stock.both my grandmothers, one of which is sitting right here played piano, my grandma playedrecorder. my dad would sing beach boys songs for mein the bathtub when i was a baby. and on weekends my mom was cleaning the house,she would play frank sinatra and george gershwin songs throughout the family stereo, pausingonly to make sure that i would slow dance
with her at least once a weekend.when i was in fourth grade, i saw my very first show at the shrine amphitheater.it was my dad's and i favorite band at the time our r.e.m.and in sixth grade i proclaimed to my parents that oasis was the second coming of the beatles.[laughter] >>will: by seventh grade i realized that theyweren't the second coming of anything. [laughter]>>will: it was then that on family trips to san francisco my parents would drop me offat amoeba with the brownbag lunch so i could spend the whole day looking for records.senior year of high school, the same year that i, my friends and i won a battle of thebands for this rap group we were in called
all about backflips.[laughter] >>will: my future co-founder and best friendand i bob started a music magazine called 'paper airplane'.and it was also that same year that i realized that you could actually study music industryin school. and i think, i realized that i wanted to bein the music business when i was grounded on halloween, my dad took me to see the moviealmost famous. and there's that really nerdy guy who hangsout with rock stars and it was sort of then that i realized that he wasn't nerdy at all,he was the coolest dude i'd ever seen. [laughter]>>will: and that's what i wanted to do.
so creativity for me as a kid was really justabout pursuing whatever felt right. like i was always journaling a lotand when i discovered hip-hop i immediately just started writing in the style that i waslistening to. i was never really musically inclined.like i can read music and play piano but i really just always approached music as a collector.you know i think it's just something that has always spoken to me.and it was there from when i was a kid and i can't imagine my life without it really.>>farzad: so wait. two things in there.one, as in the preparation for this interview you didn't tell me about that hip-hop group.[laughter]
>>farzad: 'cause you knew i would've foundthat. uh—>>will: it's pretty embarrassing. >>farzad: but secondly, you mentioned pursuinga career in music. you found out about school and so, yeah, soat what point did you make the decision to go down to usc and then—>>will: yeah so— >>farzad: pursue the whole music thing?>>will: when i was in high school, when i graduated i went to chico state which hada really great music industry program. but there were aspects of that program thati like. for example they had their own record label.they had a great college radio station.
but it wasn't in one of the hubs for the musicindustry which is new york and la. so i applied to the music industry program.the bachelor of science in music industry and got in.and so i moved to la. in the first summer i got there before i wentto school i was interning at universal. and so i interned from one o'clock until 7pm in the afternoon. and before that to pay for my apartment iwas working at coffee bean from five in the morning until noon.so i had that whole summer to sort of like get ready for this transition i was makingto go to usc. and usc was really, i kind of cut my teethjust doing internships.
and i became the hip-hop music director atour radio station. it was there that i first interviewed an artistfor the first time. i had mers come on my show.and i also interviewed atmosphere who in high school was like my favorite rapper.and i'll never forget the feeling of just being in the presence of someone that youhave such respect for and reverence for. and that nervous feeling you get, much thesame way as sitting out in front of an audience of people that you don't know.[laughter] >>will: but that same feeling that i had thenhas transferred over to every single interview i've ever done.and that feeling that i get when meeting someone
that you really love and have invested youremotions into is still so exciting to me. and i just kept chasing that throughout collegeand then in my professional life when i graduated. actually before i graduated i got an internshipat yahoo music. and then when i graduated i became a full-timeemployee there. and founded the indie music department there.and just tried to figure out how to fit interviewing artists and being around artists into prettymuch every aspect of my job. wherever i could.cuz i just thought, i wanted to develop that skill but i also just found it so excitingand rewarding to. >>farzad: let's talk about one of the firstendeavors you did.
when you were working at imeem –>>will: yeah. >>farzad: at yahoo i suppose.and that wasn't interview series called "keys to the city".tell us a little bit about that. >> will: sure yeah so imeem was a streamingmusic service. and i got there pretty early on when theywere still figuring out the strategy, their content strategy.and i have a lot of leeway to come up with programs and launch programs that i thoughtwould help market the brand in different ways. and so one of the sites main constituencieswhose hip-hop. so i started a documentary series called "keysto the city" where i would go to all these
various locales to document the local hip-hopscenes and have rappers take me around their hometowns.the first one we did was in philly. it was the roots and diplo who participatedin that one. and then, we went to seattle to do a documentaryseries about all the seattle mc's who really, it's like a really strong scene up there butthey haven't been able to launch any national stars.but when you go there it's like this big fraternity. and the "keys to the city" series was reallyeye-opening because we were traveling on our own dimes to do this.it didn't have any support from imeem. it was just stuff that myself and bob woulddo.
my partner bob would do on the weekends.and so we flew ourselves to la. we flew ourselves to seattle and all overthe place to do this series cuz we thought that these stories needed to be told.and this is my first experience with video production at all.i mean we rent, we borrowed bob's cousin's kind of like crappy camera to go do this stuff.and we just went and tried it. and i think a lot of the skills that i acquiredfrom being an interviewer and being a producer came from this trial and error that we weregetting in this "keys to the city" series. we ended up getting some great acts.like we interviewed the game and compton around la.and nate went up to canada to do a piece on
kardinal offishall who's a really big canadianrapper. they took him around toronto for a coupleof days and he came back with some great stuff from there.and it was also at imeem that i met both nate and caleb who round out our founding crewat yours truly. nate was actually if you go to the next slide.nate was producing and shooting take away shows which are basically kind of the grandfathersof performance videos online and— farzad: so the difference isn't on "keys tothe city" was just interview strictly? >>will: it was interviews and just kind ofmore in-depth documentary. so like, the funny thing is that not a lotof that content is online.
because it was all uploaded to imeem whichno longer exists. so you can't really go back and watch a lotof the "keys to the city" stuff. but we did stuff on raphael saadiq in oakland.a bunch of great videos that i think are hopefully on a hard drive somewhere.but they're definitely not online. >>farzad: this is, 'the take away show', startedabout 2006. and that's from the blog called la blogotheque.i'm sure you guys are familiar with them. they sort of had a network of bloggers andyou and nate i guess both were. >>will: yeah so nate.i didn't know nate, but he was shooting take away shows.and he connected with the mission of the take
away shows and reached out to the founderchryde. and he was the san francisco arm of the takeaway shows. and i found chryde separately just from beinga huge music fan. and when chryde came to san francisco fornoise pop in 2007, he introduced me to nate. he's like, you know one of the dudes fromthe take away show lives here. and so immediately upon meeting nate, he andi started working on stuff together. we started producing videos that ended upon imeem. and producing take away shows like this leakylee take away show we shot on a beautiful blustery san francisco day.and it was also at that time that i met caleb,
one of those like music industry schmoozefest kind of things. and caleb and i actually connected over ourmutual admiration for the walkman, the band the walkman.and we actually just had the chance to shoot the walkman after years of kind of like waitingand hoping that we would get a chance to work with them.>>farzad: just on this past tour when they were here.>>will: yeah, yeah. just on this past tour.they came for the 10 year anniversary show. so they came by studio different fur whichis on 19th and valencia. it's actually where we shot the very firstgeorge truly video with waves.
and i think when he was doing the video, hethought that he was shooting a take away show. and, surprise.this is a yours truly video. [laughter]>>kavon: so, i mean i feel like we've already gotten uses of the story.but kind of like what was missing in the music industry?or what was missing in your view that kind of you know birthed yours truly?i mean i feel like we've heard a little bit of adhesive, but put it together for us.>>will: yeah, i think you know we took a hard look at the music landscape of the time.we saw these different verticals. there is a sales and subscription, there'snews and criticism, there's music discovery
which the thousands of music blogs that weread every day and there's music is lifestyle. and one of our biggest challenges was figuringout how could we differentiate ourselves in this already overcrowded space.what can we do to compel users to come to yours truly instead of any of these othermusic brands that they trusted every day. and so in figuring out that value proposition,one of the things that is just as important to figuring out who you are is to figure outwhat you're not. and so we knew that you know if you wanteda record review you go to pitchfork. if you wanted to watch music video, you goto youtube. if you wanted to listen to an mp3, you goto hypemachine.
but if you wanted to learn more about an artistbeyond their mp3 or watching their music video. if you wanted to get to know them as people,or to watch them create their craft you know firsthand like you were sitting right there.there really wasn't much out there for you. and so instead of you know trying to competewith all these brands up here, we decided that if we were going to win we had to inventour own game. and so we use what skills we had which wastalented filmmakers, passionate journalists and we created a format to put the artiststhat we loved in the best light possible. and so what the take away shows we were doing,was they were putting artists into their format which was the take away show which to me isstill the most revolutionary format out there.
but we decided that we wanted to adapt perartist and give them whatever situation fit them best.and from a brand perspective, it was really just about focusing on what we thought wecould do really well and iterating on that process and innovating within those confines.and so it's really just kind of a choice between do you want to be mcdonald's or do you wantto be in and out burger? mcdonald's has something for everyone.you know they got chicken nuggets, and those suck and the big macs suck too.but when you go to in and out burger and you know that there's three things on the menuand everything is good. you know exactly what you're getting and youget it every single time.
>>kavon: nice, alright so –>>farzad: so, you're not inspired – >>farzad and kavon: by mcdonald's.>>will: i'm not inspired by mcdonald's. >>farzad: that's a good segue.>>will: although apparently when i was a baby my nickname was william "the refrigerator"perry. they called me "the fridge", and apparentlyi could put down like three cheeseburgers as a two-year-old.[laughter] >>kavon: so i think that people love, i meani definitely do and maybe i'm just gonna latch on to like making this a question.like what are you inspired by? i mean i feel like i watch some your videosand i have such a distinct yours truly take
on this.like you've almost created your own genre or your own way of approaching music.what do you guys look for in inspiration right? what inspires you guys or you know sent youon this path. >>will: sure, i think you know there are fourof us that do yours truly and each of us have different points of inspiration.and it's a combination of those four people who come from very different backgrounds withvery different sets of tastes that make yours truly what it is.but we also agreed on a few things about the brand.you know, we agreed on a few things we wanted the brand to stand for.but in terms of inspiration, i get it from
a couple of things.wax poetics magazine is one of my all-time favorite magazines.it's incredibly well done, well researched. it's basically about soul music and latinmusic and african-american culture throughout the years.their photo of the guy with the pink sunglasses is taken by jason nocito who's the principalphotographer at the fader magazine. the bicycle is by william eggleston who'slargely considered to be the father of color photography.aaron rose is kind of your renaissance man. he the curator of 'the beautiful losers'.and just he really straddles the line between commercial and fine art.there's also geoff mcfetridge on there which,
his hand has touched so many major brands.pepsi, nike, new york times you name it. jay-z is kind of the king of the brand extensionin my opinion. you know jay-z may not sell the most records,but he's by far the most well respected artist. and he's been able to take the equity in hisbrand and apply it to so many different areas which is truly amazing i think.so, and then, the black-and-white image you see is a film by bruce weber on the saxophoneplayer chad baker. and that film you know shot on 16mm black-and-whiteis just such an amazing portrait of that artist. it's completely unflinching and a brave portraitof him. and ultimately what we wanted to do was setout to tell stories.
and what the thing in common that all of thesethings have is that these are all brands that do a great job of presenting stories in themost honest and direct way possible. at the very base of it, you know these areinspiration points. these are influences of ours.but at the end of the day it's really the music.i mean there is no better feeling than finding a new artist.like i get no bigger rush that when caleb sends me a band that i've never heard of.or when i find a band on the blog or on myspace or band camp that i've never heard of.and it's like you start listening and it's really good in then you're like "oh god pleasestay good, please stay good."
and then it keeps being good and then—[laughter] >>will: and then the songs over and you'relike, "oh my god, if this band has one more good song it's over."[laughter] >>will: so like it's really just the music.and there is so much that, there is no shortage of inspiration out there.you know every day, or at least every week i try to make sure to find one band that blowsme away. >>kavon: thank you internet.>>will: yeah, thank you internet. >>farzad: so discovery is a big part of yourstruly. but also can you tell us about sort of thevisual and philosophical concepts behind the
brand.in particular the logo. >>will: sure.>>kavon: which is absolutely beautiful by the way.it's – >>will: yeah>>kavon: it's very distinctive. >>will: yeah, we spent about six months everyweekend and most weekend nights at bob's house trying to figure out how to present this logo.and bob who's the designer of this logo is our creative director and he's a graphic designerby trade. and so a lot of our graphical influences comefrom his vision. and basically what we decided on was we wantedto think about what yours truly really was
at its core.and ultimately what we're doing is we're shadowing artists.we're following them around. we're capturing their stories, but ultimatelywe're watching them. we're standing behind them.we're shadowing them. and so, this idea of t shadowing the y comesfrom that philosophy that we are there to you know discover and document, capture andcatapult and ultimately shadow these artists that we admire.and deserve to be covered by us. >>farzad: when you started to get this thingoff the ground, before anybody really knows who you are.i mean how do you actually gain access to
artists?>>will: we booked it through a publicist that i knew named daniel gill who represents alot of great bands. and waves was in san francisco.this was really you know right before he started to get some, started to get some traction.i think a lot of it has to do with getting onto bands early.you know getting involved in their careers early on before they blow up.and there's a lot of evidence of that with yours truly.and it's like artists before they get big are just more flexible, easier to work with,have more time. but one of the biggest things was the factthat we were in san francisco.
so, you know bands have a lot to do in la.they have a lot to do in new york. but often times they are just hanging outin san francisco because there's really no, there really was no media outlet.like yours truly in san francisco. so we were able to get access to bands basedon my relationships and caleb's relationships with label people, with publicist.with managers and with bands. but ultimately it was just the quality ofthe work we were able to show them early on. you know we shot that first waves video andthe band loved it. i was able to get it on gorilla versus bearand fader and stereo gum and pitchfork right from the outset.so right away we were building a case study
for what yours truly could be and what thebenefits for you a band would be for doing yours truly.and i think this slide is actually meant to talk about the brand of yours truly.and i kind of want to do that for a sec if i can.so everything about yours truly begins and ends with the name."yours truly". which is a way to sign a letter.and a lot of our core values come from this act of letter writing.so "yours truly" stands for careful curation. because you're not just gonna write a letterto anyone. if you're gonna put the time and effort intowriting some a letter you have to make sure
that that person is going to reciprocate orthey're really worth the time and effort you're willing to put in.so we think about that every time we choose bands."yours truly" stands for high quality but handcrafted.if you're gonna write a letter, then you're gonna do your best to you know give your bestpenmanship. even though mine is always terrible.[laughter] but you're gonna do your best to make it lookgood. but at the same time, like if you mess upor something that's just part of the fact that there's a human writing it.and so we want people to see that yours truly
is made by real people who really care aboutwhat they are doing. and lastly, when you write a letter you wantto be proud to sign the letter and then give that letter to someone.this is yours. truly.and so we think about that every time we make a video.you know this is kind of a little gift for the bands.it gives them another reason to go out and get people to fall in love with them.it's a gift to fans, to get to see another side of an artist that they didn't get tosee. or to discover an artist they never knew existed.or to hear an artist speak for the first time.
and for us, the gift is that we get to spendthis time with these musicians that we a lot of times have crushes on or love and adoreor just are really passionate about. >>farzad: i think the next thing we want totalk about is sort of what is your model for marketing and distribution?on the web. >>kavon: i mean you guys don't have ads onyour website. >>will: yeah.>>kavon: you don't have mass marketing campaigns. you know, i mean, everyone here works at google,so we know that revenue, you don't need revenue right away.but kinda like what is your plan. >>will: yeah.so i sort of equate the yours truly business
model to two cross-sections of a house.the outside of the house is the beautiful facade, the architecture, the big open windows,the fresh coat of paint. and that's the yours truly brand.that's what we've been really developing this whole time.so whether you see it on our website on our facebook our twitter our tumbler or you watchit on our channel on pitchfork tv or you see yours truly videos on any of the blogs thatwe push out to. or our partnership with mtv.this the strength in the brand that's been able to get us these integrated partnershipswith brands like mtv, pitchfork, odyssey which is a local speaker company.we've also done stuff with levis and urban
outfitters.and so it's this strength in the brand that's been able to give us these opportunities tomake partnerships where our brand and their brand are getting married for short periodof time to do these series. and that feeds the other side of the housewhich is yours truly's services. where we offer production services to brands,to media companies like pandora or mtv or beer brands or companies like levis, likechevy, w hotels, braun, aces. any number of these companies that see thework that yours truly does in its public facing side.and, you know, attached themselves to that work and then realized that we would be agreat fit for a series that they're producing
for their own purposes.so it's sort of this hybrid model of we are a public facing brand and an editorial brand.but we're also a production company offering production services.and it's a cool reciprocation because you know just last week someone from an agencyreached out and they said you know, "i really like the way yours truly videos look i wantto do a series on several artists for a beer brand that i'm working on."and so in that case, we offer our producers and directors to go execute whatever campaignsthat they're trying to do. and that's a good way for us to make moneyso that we can continue to do all the free editorial stuff that we really want to do.>>kavon: yeah.
and so tell us about how the web has likeplayed into that right? i mean you guys are a blog, or started asa blog right? and so—>>will: yeah. >>kavon: what is the web allow you to do?and like kind of compare yourself to maybe even a traditional record company right?what are you guys using? how are you using technology to replace certainaspects of it? >>will: yeah, i mean, i think one of the decisionswere made early on. and this has a lot to do with the fact thatwe decided not have advertising was that if you want to sell advertising, you have todrive traffic to your site.
but what we wanted to do was to create a pushmodel where instead we would focus on the content and getting the content out to asmany places as possible. rather than trying to suck people back toour site. so as soon as we release a video, we're encouragingall the blogs who are fans of this band to post our video and to link back to our site.so that's to help drive home the brand equity. but also to just expand the reach of our contentitself. because we've always been about the content.the content creation process. so, we always have had this push model wherewe are leveraging all the assets that are created in the process.so there's the video, there's the audio of
the session that will upload to soundcloudthat will route through our facebook or our twitterand in an effort to get more likes, or get people to re-tweet.we do contests for tickets and giveaways and stuff like that.and basically it's just about leveraging the assets that are created while were shootingthe band. so while were shooting bands, we're takinginstagram photos and posting those posting that to facebook.and really it's kind of a different way than a lot of bands approach.sorry not bands, a lot of websites approach building a brand.but for us it's worked.
it's gotten us to be featured and in conversationson all these sites that are outside of our network.and to get people to you know, maybe if they see it the first time they'll just watchedthe video. but maybe if they keep seeing content on theseother sites that they already go to and they keep seeing this link to yours truly, they'llend up coming back and realizing that we have this huge catalog of bands that we've beenshooting. pieces that we've collected over the years.that's kind of how we've done it. >>kavon: you guys have done a great job.>>will: thanks bud. >>kavon: love that graphic back there.>>farzad: so before we get into more of how
you guys are using the web and actually southby southwest where on one and the musicians and then the interactive side sort of cametogether, met in the middle and you guys were actually out there together for a day or two.>>will: yeah. >>farzad: we want to watch something brand-newfrom you guys. this is actually, i think it's sort of premieredon youtube music. >>will: yeah>>farzad: that's where i first saw it. jacob mcpherson from the youtube team threwthis up on the web a couple days ago where you guys were featured on the music page.so let's check it out. this is a really cool video.>>lee fields: oh, man i feel good today.
had to get that out, you know.you got a laugh inside you sometimes. a lot of people don't know.but my, i live by the rules of if you keep a laugh on the inside it'll hurt you later.so if you got a laugh, laugh i don't, let it go.don't hold it down. i believe laughter is a good remedy.i'm not a doctor; don't claim to be a doctor. i'll let the doctors be doctors and lawyersbe lawyers, politicians be the politicians. i'm a singer, that's what i do.[guitar music] >>lee fields: [singing, blues style]i've always been a faithful man. til you came along.i've always been a grateful man.
i've always been a faithful man.[saxaphone joins in with guitar music] >>lee fields: don't make me do wrong.baby. don't make me do wrong.i've always been a faithful man til you – [just saxophone music]>>lee fields: came along. [just guitar music]>>lee fields: i was just hanging out. trying to clear my mind.i saw you eyeing me. it was plain to see.said i was a married man. said you were 23.don't make me do wrong. baby.don't make me do wrong.
[saxophone joins guitar music]>>lee fields: nooooooooo! don't you know.[just guitar music] >>lee fields: i've always been a gratefulman. til you came along.i've always been a faithful man. i've always been a grateful man.[saxophone joins guitar music] [just saxophone music]>>lee fields: came along. [just guitar music]>>lee fields: we were just hanging out. didn't mean a thing.but when i start walking out, something came over me.never felt so guilty.
[saxophone joins guitar]>>lee fields: never felt so good. don't make me do wrong.baby. don't make me do wrong.noooooooooo! >>lee fields: i've always been a faithfulman. i've always been a faithful man.[saxophone joins guitar] [just saxophone music]came along. [saxophone and guitar music]>>lee fields: yeeeaaahhhhh!! i've always been a faithful man til you camealong. always been a grateful man.i've always been a faithful man.
don't make me do wrong.don't make me do wrong. i've always been a faithful man til you –[just saxophone music] >>lee fields: came along.>>farzad: very cool [applause]>>will: i had just made him breakfast in our kitchen right before he did that.and we had chickens in the backyard of the house.and so, he was, he wouldn't shut up about the fact that we had fresh eggs."i haven't had fresh eggs since 1973 and they don't taste the same."[laughter] >>will: but when he did that scream, thatlike animals scream, i swear the house was
like reverberating. it was insane.it was really fun >>farzad: so that was something you guys filmedin austin? >>will: yeah, yeah.so we were up out there from monday to monday this year.so one of our official showcases which the white poster right there.that was during interactive, so it was the last night of interactive.and caleb produces all of our events. so he put together this event and then anotherevent in partnership with gorilla versus bear. that's the poster on the right.so that was at the hype machine hotel. they have different bloggers curate differentshows.
and so we did those two official showcasesand then the poster with the state of texas on it is a poster for our 'in my room' series.which is in partnership with mtv. and then there's just some stills there.>>kavon: you guys were really busy. >>will: we were very busy yeah.it was a lot of fun, but we shot 10 different bands and we had those shows.it took a lot of, bunch of meetings. and just catch up with people in the musicbusiness that you only know over e-mail over the phone.it's like so that what you look like in person. so there was a lot of that that goes on to.but it was tons of fun. and that was the first piece that we releasedfrom our south by southwest section.
that lee fields video.>>kavon: so your label, 'love letters inc.' >>will: mmm hmm.>>kavon: you know it really kind of, you guys are in on.in business terms you're like vertically integrated right.kind of going end to end. can you give us kind of a sense of your planis in that sense. i mean are you guys, like gonna be the firstpeople to go from a blog to a full blown record label.>>will: we wouldn't be the first no. there's plenty of—>>kavon: yeah, there's a lot of people. >>will: there's plenty of examples of thatactually.
one of the best examples is a blog out ofthe uk called transparent blog. and they released the first washed out singleand a bunch of other ones. and now one of the guys has an imprint on,domino records. but our idea with love letter inc. was reallyjust to; it's kind of a brand extension of yours truly.it's really based on our love for physical objects.just like letters. we love to be able to hold something.so we wanted to be able to give our fans something that they could hold.something that we could design. something that we could be involved in fromstart to finish.
so when bands are coming through san franciscoto do yours truly sessions. they're playing songs they've written foran album of theirs or an ep of theirs. or something that they've done themselves.but in order to keep innovating, in order to keep you know doing something new withour format we wanted to get involved earlier on in the process.so in the songwriting process. or in the recording process.and we wanted to offer our fans and fans of these bands better insight into what thatprocess was like. what does it take to make a record?so the first record that we ended up doing was this big k.r.i.t record.and big k.r.i.t put out a mix tape that i
listened to and loved and this was beforehe got signed at def jam. and was kind of like a full-fledged rap starnow. but i begged his manager to fly out to sanfrancisco. and i was gonna put them in the studio withthis great local r&b band. so he came to san francisco, crashed on mycouch for a couple of days and we made this ep.and that became the first yours truly release. and the second one 'how to dress well'.the white background with the image in the middle.that was a tribute record of the 'how to dress well'.tom who is managed by caleb.
one of his best friends died.and so what he wanted to do is this ep called 'just once'.where he would do orchestral versions of his songs that we would release on 10 inch vinyl.and make available for sale. and the one thing that's unique but is alsocommon to each of the releases is that they each have a charity element to them.the big k.r.i.t record, 100% of the proceeds go to the, go to charity.the nitro records, and 'how to dress well' record, one dollar of every sale goes to charity.so what we really wanted to do was create these physical objects and be involved inthe record making process. but also, create something that we could useto get back to the communities that deserve
it.>>kavon: you know i keep on hearing the word create with you guys and that's what i loveabout you. it's like you're always you know.you always, you didn't see that there were like these behind the scenes videos.so you went and created them right? and now it's like you want your vinyl recordsright? so you're gonna go and create them.>>will: yeah >>kavon: what else do you guys, you know,what other project you guys got up your sleeves? like what else is going on with the yourstruly. >>will: you know were constantly producingvideos.
and it's these short either short form documentariesto performance pieces to these making of pieces. we're doing epks and you know making of albumpieces. we did a live concert dvd of the documentary.but really what we're looking forward to this year is bringing the yours truly experienceinto the living room. which is something that i know youtube isfocused on too. as well as vimeo.bringing yours truly into the living room. improving the yours truly site.getting yours truly on ipads and iphones. just improving our distribution model to getyou, into as many eyeballs in as many homes as possible.as well as to continue to produce the same
high-quality content that we have been doingall along. but i'll give you kind of a sneak previewof one project that i'm excited about. it's the stagger lee project.so in 1895 in a st. louis saloon this pimp and hustler and notorious character namedstagger lee shot billy lyon in the back of the head for trying to steal his stetson hat.and so this story that happened in the late 1800s as soon as it happened it swept throughthe south and it was played and covered by whorehouse pianist to just pool balladeers.and passed along before recorded music ever occurred.just as sort of a folktale. and every time whoever sang it would reinterpretit and stagger lee gets scarier and scarier.
and he's just this bad villain like character.and then when recorded music came around, the song has since been recorded over 400times by elvis presley, bob dylan, bo diddley. you name it, the black keys.you name it, someone has a version of the song.and so this character of stagger lee, this badass character has been translated intoall these different forms of music except for the one form that i think it really fitsand that's hip-hop. and so what i wanted to do was to update thestagger lee saga for the 21st century. to basically find two artists who could playthe parts of stagger lee and of billy lyon. but before they do that, i wanted them tosteep themselves in the history of blues music.
which is what created this song.so the idea is to send big k.r.i.t. and yellow wolf down to the mississippi delta.to have them take a trip to clarksdale mississippi where bb king was born and robert johnsonwas born. and to basically soak up the roots of bluesmusic and to use that influence to create a new version of the stagger lee song.and we would create a documentary about that journey.a documentary about the making of that song. release that song.do a music video for that song. and basically what the goal is to bridge thegap between this american roots and folk music that it has influenced not only hip-hop butr&b and rock 'n roll.
and try and bridge the gap between what kidsare listening to today and this great tradition of american music that is in danger of extinction.and i just remember reading the story for the first time and just thinking this hasto be told. and then when i finally heard big k.r.i.t'smusic, i realize that he was the guy who could play stagger lee because he's from mississippi.he's a producer. his music is so bluesy and soulful and i thoughtyou're the guy, your stagger lee. so we have this idea, and it's really justsomething were trying to get made at this point.>>farzad: that sounds really awesome. got a little bit of time left.and i think that means that it's time to jump
on our hangout with chris who you might'veheard for a second there. so i'm just going to move the computer upso that he can see us all. or at least see us up here.and yeah, let's try to do this. >>will: is he hanging out?>>farzad: hopefully this works. chris are you here?there he is. >>chris chu: hey you guys.hey how are you? we got farzad.>>kavon: what's up dude, thanks for coming. [laughter]virtual reality. >>chris chu: seeing the side of your face,it looks good.
[laughter]>>farzad: awesome. chris, thanks so much for taking the time to be with us.of course one of the most celebrated videos from yours truly comes from the morning benders'"excuses". i think we all pretty much fell for it thefirst time we saw it. >>kavon: instantaneously.>>farzad: i think it's been well, i'll ask you.what's it been like for the band, what was it like making the video, what was the reactionwhich guys got? >>chris chu: it was great honestly.just thinking back to that day is so special. and i think, we've done a lot of sessionsand music videos and stuff like that.
and almost 95% of the time we do them we haveno idea how it's gonna turn out and it's just, you kind of let it go and we just hope forthe best it. but when we did that session, we just feltlike this is gonna be something special. we knew it from the moment i think that wewere done that day. and then we saw the first captures we wereblown away. >>kavon: awesome.and you know what did it do for you guys as a band?i mean like people see music videos but nothing quite like that.>>chris chu: yeah, yeah. i feel like that was one piece of contentabove anything else that we've ever done that
people knew about us.you know we went on tour all over the world and by far the most common thing people wouldsay was you know i love seeing you guys play that song on the roof.playing that song on yours truly or whatever. >>kavon: yeah>>chris chu: people definitely got the word out about it spread around which is most powerfulthing you can do. >>farzad: that's awesome.well, we do hope that you guys have plans to work with yours truly in the future.but not as a morning benders, it's going to be as pop etc.can you tell us a little bit about the name change and what we can expect from the newgroup if you could call it that?
>>chris chu: yeah.well i wrote kind of a detailed explanation of why we changed the name.which i can go into just briefly i guess. we have time for that?>>farzad: sure. just briefly that's fine totally.>>chris chu: yeah, i mean we named our band morning benders early on like a lot of bandsdo without thinking about it very much. [laughter]>>chris: i mean we thought it was funny or whatever and didn't think much about it.but we found out at some point like about a year and a half or two years down the linethat there's this alternate meaning in the uk and europe that "benders" is kind of likea slang word or the equivalent of fag or gay
as used in america.like kids call somebody "gay" thinking it's funny.and you know were not like super pc guys or felt like, you know.it's not like something we would correct someone on the street and yell at them.but when it comes to our band and what we are associated with it just made sense forus to not be associated with that. because it felt like it was giving off thisfeeling or this expression that isn't in keeping with how we feel and how we lead our lives.it just, it became ignorant. you know kids thought we were making a jokeagainst gays. that's just, that's not a joke we would makeyou know.
so were pop etc. now.and we have a lot of exciting stuff. >>will: and killer tunes.>>farzad: yeah. if you guys haven't heard the new mix tapeyet, you can download it for free on their website popetc.com is that right?.>>chris chu: yeah. >>farzad: and do you think also the new bandname in some ways is a prelude to the new sound?>>chris: yeah, i was telling will the other day that the motivation behind the name changewas well what i just told you. but it definitely aligned itself with thiscreative changes well. we have a whole different set of stuff.and we've always told all our fans that we
want to change, were not creatively satisfiedby staying in the same place. so i know people get their hopes up and theywant to hear big echo 2 again or whatever. [laughter]>>chris: but we just can't. i think there's a lot of bands do do thatover and over again. they make five or six albums that sound generallythe same. which is great for some people, but for usit's not how we want to do it. so yet we have this great mix tape out.and we got a full album coming after that. and hopefully some cool videos and stuff aswell. >>kavon: very exciting.so, do you know, do you guys actually have
a release date for that yet?>>chris chu: we don't have an exact release date.but it'll be sometime over the summer like early summer.it's a very summery album, so we wanted to align with that.>>farzad: ok. and hopefully coming back to play a hometownshow if i could call it that. >>chris chu: oh yeah.>>farzad: sometime soon? >>chris chu: of course.yes it's definitely a hometown show. we still consider ourselves bay area kids.and we talked a lot about how we're gonna and end up back there.so next time hopefully i'll be in the room
with you we all at google can hang out.>>kavon: hey, that would be awesome. >>farzad: you're welcome any time.>>kavon: yep. chris, do you wanna actually.chris do you have like 10 minutes? or do you have like 6 minutes?>>chris chu: yeah. >>kavon: cuz we might open up to questions.and we can have you and will respond to people's thoughts and questions interrogations.>>chris chu: sure. >>kavon: do we have a microphone?>>chris chu: hanging out. >>kavon: alright cool yeah, hangout.[laughter] >>kavon: that was a marketing plug.we paid him to say that.
do we have a microphone or no?that thing work? perfect, does anybody have any questions oryours truly or chris chu. lisa.>>lisa: i was just wondering— >>kavon: you wanna give>>farzad: we'll just repeat the question. >>kavon: ok.>>lisa: how much work, how much time and effort go into drafting each videos?>>will: wow. well there is a sort of like three differentphases of it. there is the booking of the band which isfinding the bands first of all which takes a lot of work.i have google reader of about 300 different
blogs that i read every day.i probably say the same is true for caleb and nate but probably 300 different blogs.there's the finding of the band. then there's the booking of the band whichis a bunch of e-mails back and forth with their publicist or their manager, just figuringout where we're gonna do with how we;re gonna do it.then figuring out how it's gonna get recorded. and then there's the actual day of the shootwhich is usually just a few hours. and then there's the post production processwhich is handled by nate or bob who are editing the video.and that's really the most time intensive process.so if i had to put like an hour on each video
i would say like 16 hours what do you thinknate? 16 to 24 hours maybe.i mean it depends on the content too. like if we're doing a documentary or evena short documentary that's really narrative in nature.then that takes much longer to edit than like a performance piece would.but like i said it's these, it's this whole kind of start to finish process that.it takes a while but it's gratifying. >>farzad: do you find that the quality ofartist that you work with actually helps that process.i mean like when i look at the morning benders video and i see this performance like it lookseffortless.
but i can imagine it was an easy thing toget in a room full of people— >>will: well that's all chris.>>farzad: multiple drummers. >>will: i mean, that was chris's, this islike his. i sort of see it as like your swan song forsan francisco. like a going away present.you like those are all your friends, and i remember we were just hanging out.like i knew you just from being at different fur.and it was sort of like yours truly was just getting started and you guys were enough finishinga new album and you are playing me the mixes. and you were like, "i have this idea thati want to do this piece and invite all these
people."and it was an honor for you to have us do it.and i think that the fact that it came out that way is just, we kind of met in the middleand just got it done that day. and the stars aligned and all that stuff.but yeah i do think it has something to do with the quality of the artists.and like i was saying earlier, we think about people that really kind of deserve the attentionand deserve our effort. because it is a lot of work to put into aband. and so we kind of take this less is more approachwhere we'd rather shoot way less stuff and have it be way better than just be constantlyproducing content just because we have to.
if we had a bigger team than i think you knowwe might be able to do that. but at the same time, we like just you knowmaking each thing we do very special and putting our all into it.>>farzad: awesome. unfortunately, we're actually running outof time. >>will: really, that was it?>>farzad: so i'm gonna have to call today. [laughter]>>farzad: thank you so much everybody for coming out, chris thank you[applause] >>farzad: catch you later man.>>will: later chris, see ya.
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