Amplify London Interview: Ruff Sqwad Arts Foundation’s co-founder and young people chat to LMF Trustee

Ruff Sqwad Arts Foundation (RSAF) is one of the organisations we are supporting through Amplify London, our fund in partnership with YouTube Music. We funded RSAF’s You Can’t Handle The Beat project over the summer in 2020, which trained young producers, sound engineers and artists from Tower Hamlets to create an EP in the RSAF studio.

Patrick, one of LMF’s Trustees, interviewed Prince Rapid, RSAF’s co-founder, and Olumide & Mellos, two of the young people who took part in the project.

Prince, why did RSAF get involved with Amplify?

Prince: London Music Fund and Amplify support organisations who support young people, and support high quality access to the arts for young people. We care about the ethos of our funders, so we applied for this because it fits with our own aims. YouTube was an amazing brand to be associated with too, very relevant for us. Our fundraiser Sian heard about the fund through Foundation for Future London and sent it to us.

Did you create this project for the application or were you doing projects like this already?

Prince: We were already doing projects like this – we are always creating new music and new art. On Fridays we work with Spotlight Centre and we run a 4-5 hour drop in session for young people to come, be creative, make music, learn about it, engage with their peers. But therse are very hectic sessions, so lots of people don’t get 1:1 time or don’t get to finish their recordings. So the new programme was to create summer sessions for young people to do what they want to do with enough time for creativity and learning the fundamentals of music production, writing, engineering. We added a competition aspect and this made them work harder, with focus towards the music video at the end.

Mellos, how did you get involved?

Mellos: I’ve been working with Rapid and Slix for 3 or 4 years now. I started going to Spotlight when I was 18, now I’m 21. It was hard to record at Spotlight because it was crowded and always tight for time. In the summer time I received a phone call from Rapid and Slix offering me sessions every week. I worked with young producers my age (age 14-20).

It was really good because I won the competition and it was just a really good experience.

What about you Olu?

Olu: I started going to Spotlight around 2016. Rapid taught me how to engineer and I’ve learnt this skill over the years. I was told about the summer project last year, and that I would be getting paid to engineer. It was after lockdown and there wasn’t much going on so it really provided some escapism from everything.

It’s amazing that you could do this in that period in the summer between lockdowns. What was it like?

Prince: Things were starting to calm down. We could run studio sessions if we were 2 metres apart, wearing masks, and washing hands regularly. The young people were still so enthusiastic, and the parents of younger siblings and so on were bringing them because they really wanted to engage with stuff to do.

Mellos, how did you manage with all the regulations and younger children etc?

Mellos: There was a rule in studio where only 4 or 5 people were allowed. There was space between the mic, the engineering board, the chairs – everyone had to keep their distance.

It was not a problem although it was a weird situation. It was new to everyone but we adapted.

Prince: Mellos and older musicians had their own sessions, and the younger children had their own cluster – the older musicians didn’t mix with the younger age group.

Olu, how about you? Did you struggle with the restrictions?

Olu: We previously worked at Spotlight which is a youth club so a lot of the people on the programme are familiar with it – everyone was comfortable and behaved. Everyone had a purpose and was focused and it was fun. Personally I didn’t struggle at all.

Was the project an important moment for you? Was it a release from everything?

Olu: this was so important for my mental health. It’s a social space too, you’re all making art together, laughing and talking – it’s a fun process.

Mellos: 100%. Being locked down in my house wasn’t the best thing for me. Music is my career so the fact that I could still record was a big blessing to me.

How did you feel when it was over?

Mellos: It wasn’t a good feeling to be honest because there was no studio. We were back to square one, staying at home. I was still productive in terms of writing but not recording.

Did the project give you momentum to help carry on writing?

Mellos: 100%. Being able to record makes me motivated to write more music. Even if I can’t go to studio now I know I need to be ready for when I can.

What are you writing about?

Mellos: different things – family, what I’ve been through, certain situations, girls – the usual stuff.

Has the covid situation come into your writing at all?

Mellos: Some quotations here and there.

So you won the competition – tell us about that?

Mellos: Everybody was set a task: who can make the hottest song. The winner wins a music video. But the video couldn’t happen because of covid. I was working in a duo with one of my closest friends.  We made a song and it just really took off and everyone loved it. But then, covid and we couldn’t do it.

Prince: But that’s still to come. We will do it somehow. There was another younger group aged about 12 who were going to do the other video, and we were all set to film in a gokarting range but it was cancelled cause of covid. They were gutted, but better times to come.

Prince, it looks like you managed all the studio sessions you had planned for the project. Did you manage the live local performance?

Prince: No. It was going to be at Poplar Union but they couldn’t have us. We did look at a possible live steamed performance with the audience voting [on the best song] but then we decided to use a guy called Mixtape Madness – he came in and listened to all the tracks and he picked out two of the tracks to win.

I know Mellos is a writer and performer – Olu, are you more on the engineering side?

Olu: I produce, write and engineer.

Where are you at now? What did you do after the project?

Olu: I continued writing and producing at home to keep up and keep improving. The project gave me a chance to improve my engineering skills. I worked alongside another engineer, and I learnt a lot from him and he learnt a lot from me. Everyone has their own tips and tricks so it was useful to see how other people do things. I’ve got my mac and my speakers so I’ve been able to stay productive. It’s not ideal but you make do with what you have.

What do you hope to do in the future?

Olu: I’m hoping to create an EP or something later this year and get some music out there. I finished college last year and I’m looking for an apprenticeship.

We’re seeing a lot in the news about the impact of covid on young people – their mental health, their job prospects. But what’s it actually been like for you?

Olu: It has been a struggle. I’ve been trying to learn to drive but my lessons keep being cancelled, but you’ve got to persevere.

Mellos: I’ve also been trying to get my driving license since September, it’s kept being pushed back. So I’ve lost motivation. It’s hard for people my age because there’s so much we want to do. It feels like time isn’t on our side. You tend to put yourself in this bubble of emotions. It’s hard.

Do you feel some of your youth has been taken away from you?

Mellos: Yeah because you can’t really do much. But I was thinking, I can’t do much but what can I do. Like I’ve been on social media, reading more, exercising more. So it’s helped in some ways but in terms of my career it’s had a big impact. I’ve been positive in the whole situation, I’m someone who just keeps going. I make sure I gain something everyday. There’s a negative in every positive and a positive in every negative. You just have to do what you do for the moment and keep growing.

What about you Olu?

Olu: There’s definitely some positives. I’ve had time to develop new skills. I’ve been reading for a cyber security course and I’ve just passed the first examination for that course. It’s a 50/50 situation.

Prince, do you think culture is helping us through the covid crisis?

Prince: Yeah. Music has always been an outlet for people to express themselves, whether they’re happy or not. For me too, having more time has been good – I’ve got into investing and trading which I never had time for before. Something very positive about culture and music is that when this lockdown happened loads of things shut down, but music studios were still allowed to open. We’re still in the game, still allowed to run sessions. But musicians are suffering, they can’t do shows. But the positive is a lot of people are finding new ways to make money or make art.  Our young people aren’t at a stage where they’re doing stadium tours or anything yet – they are still developing. They can still be creative with studio sessions at the moment.

Mellos, is there anything you would want to see happen differently at the moment? What one thing would you change right now?

Mellos: There is one thing I wish everyone should have and it’s more information. I’m always eager to know what’s going on and why and when it’s going to end. Things are temporary – we know this won’t last forever. But it’s the fear of the unknown – I wish we had more information on what’s going on instead of not being sure. Everyone’s panicking. It’s confusing. One day things are better, the next day it’s another 2 month lockdown.

Olu, same question to you – is there one thing you’d change?

Olu: I agree with Mellos – more clarity on what we’re able to do. A lot of the transitions have been abrupt, lockdowns have been announced a day or two days before.

Mellos: Yeah exactly. The craziest thing for me was my family’s restaurant had to shut down because they couldn’t sustain it because it was hard to make money through takeaways. They used to make income from events. Now they’re saying lockdown has been extended so they didn’t know when things would get better, so we can’t pay money to sustain it when we’re not making anything back.

I’m so sorry to hear that. Coming back to the music – being able to express yourself, to work with others, be able to communicate through music – isn’t that important in the uncertainty we live in?

Mellos: Yeah, definitely.

What does music mean to you?

Olu: Something that allows you to express and represent yourself and whatever you’re thinking and feeling in a way that’s approachable for others.

Mellos: Music for me is everything in terms of expressing myself. It’s like therapy and it helps me a lot. I don’t know what I would have done if I couldn’t go studio. If I had no access to studio for a whole year I don’t know what I would have done. Music gets me through situations.

Prince: I used to be like that at your age too.

That’s something we believe at the London Music Fund. Music is about more than learning technique right?

Mellos: A hundred million billion percent. The thing is, we’ll drop everything to be there [the studio]. It means everything to us.

Prince, any final thoughts?

Prince: What makes me happy is that the funding enabled us to pay the young people who were working for us as engineers. They had that free time at the studio as well as being paid to train and work. This is something that makes a real difference that the start of their careers and I think they will always remember it.