ARTIST SPOTLIGHT Leaf and Machine December 27th 2024 Describe the sound of your music for unfamiliar listeners We mash electronic psych sounds into mellow folk songs. All run through warbly tape decks, written to themes of loss and longing. End result is something like if Boards of Canada produced Nick Drake. How and when did you get into music? I picked up guitar in 8th grade and started making sound collage tracks and beats at around 16. Making new things and collaborating drew me in. I’d build prog-rock songs one layer at time with my friend Kyle. Put vocals on flying lotus style tracks that my brother, Jesse, was making. Leaf and Machine is three of us working together, threading a line between all those early experiments. Describe your creative process. Starts with me writing something on guitar, and singing ad-libs over that to figure out what the song’s about. Then Kyle brings in more layers of instruments, guitar leads, drums, whatever. Jesse plays producer and tears it open with production effects, synth lines, some other stray parts. That’s where things get really spacey usually. Where do you find inspiration? Just sitting around playing guitar usually. I find a little riff or chord progression that catches my imagination, like transports me somewhere in my head. And then it’s just exploring what that sound wants to grow into. Usually when it’s working the song leads you where it needs to go. What song/project should unfamiliar listeners start with? Cyberfriends. It has a little bit of everything we do in it. Any new projects soon? Anything you want to promote? We’ve been working on an EP of super lo-fi, slowcore tracks. Jesse fixed up an old tascam 388 8-track tape recorder he found at a thrift store. We’ve been coming up with these stream-of-consciousness, fuzzed-out tracks straight to tape. We have a release of our favorites from those sessions coming out in a month or two. What music have you been listening to lately? Stephen Steinbrink, he writes some of the most beautiful songs I’ve ever heard. Kind of music that makes life feel really small and giant at the same time. Listening to a lot of Jerry Paper too, he’s super inventive with how he approaches songwriting and production and has this lovely whacked-out bossa nova sound.

ARTIST SPOTLIGHT Brianna Knight May 23rd 2025 Describe your music for unfamiliar listeners 90’s R&B with a twang of Neo-Soul. It’s music for the folks who love hard and fall hard but try not to cry in public lol How’d you get into making music? My mom! She always sang around the house and then in high school I did musicals, plus a course with Berkeley online just to try songwriting. My freshman year of college, I joined a poetry collective that really transformed the way I looked at songwriting. I got invited to play at the Apollo and then I was like okay maybe we can start taking this seriously. I saw my name on the door and it clicked like okay how many more blessings do you need to truly try for this? Your latest single “Everything or Nothing” is a track that slaps on every listen. How was that song made? Last year I challenged myself to write a song everyday and a thing I focused on was using phrases. 1 day I heard the beat online and was like if I could make a song around this what would it be. Words started flowing, I could see the movie in my mind, black & white, raining, crying, genuinely one of the easier songs I’ve written and then I brought the demo to my producer but I told him let’s make this lean more 90s and switch up the chords. I had so much fun recording, finished the second verse in our final recording session and truly had to focus on telling the story. As a vocalist, you get caught up in making everything acrobatic but I genuinely wanted folks to hear my words. Where do you find the inspiration to create music? My imagination haha. I’ll hear a phrase and be like why hasn’t anybody used that or I’ll hear a melody or a poem and be like why isnt this a full song? It’s very much so a routine for me. If I don’t write at least once to twice a week I lose my mind. I need to explore out of reality sometimes or find a way to consolidate everything I’m hearing or seeing around me. Describe your creative process Depending on the mood I may just dive right in and just write what’s coming to mind. No phrases or literary elements just write down my feelings or recall the day. Other times I’ll set a timer for 5 to 10mins to expand on a phrase I heard or an item around me. Then I’ll find a beat or play around with my guitar and try to fit in as many words from that list or journal entry as possible. It’s like organizing chaos. Sometimes I’ll freestyle it and then once I have the story I’ll chop which melodies I want to use. There are times it’s a free flow and other times I feel like I’m performing surgery. I’ll sit back and ask myself okay do I need to write this better? Do I need to sang this? Do I need to tell the story better, more emotion or less? Do I need to connect emotionally or detach? My favorite thing to ask my producer is should I pull back or eat the mic haha. What song/project would you recommend for unfamiliar listeners? For a story? Bad Decisions. To vibe? So Deep. To shake some booty? Link Up. To cry? Everything or Nothing. What’s next for Brianna Knight? Any new projects soon? An EP in the fall titled Movies in my Mind. It’s coming together so follow and join my newsletter to stay updated! Besides music, what else have you been up to recently? I’ve been focused on strength training. Hit a PR on the leg press of 300lbs. It’s fun having thick thighs made of muscle. If only my core strength could match What music have you been listening to lately? Jae Stephen’s for sure and Flo but I was in a 2010’s pop mood for sure. I had Madonna Caught Up and Britney Spears Piece of Me on repeat for days!!

ARTIST SPOTLIGHT Patrick Hyacinth January 24th 2025 Describe the sound of your music for unfamiliar listeners Soundscape of the music I’m making is ever changing, depending on my current interest. For what’s out, it’s mostly electronic music with guitar over pretty chords, but I want to explore every avenue in some way. Describe your creative process. I make all kinds of instrumentals every day, then write to them, most of the time nothing really happens, but sometimes it just clicks and the song writes its self. Then it gets more chaotic as I try to define the initial idea and build around the vocals, sometimes I might not know what to do with a certain part of the song for two weeks, then it clicks and I get done with it in 30 minutes. It’s most definitely not a linear process. How’d you first get into making music? I used to make YouTube videos when I was like twelve, I used adobe audition to record audio for them, me and my friend, we discovered the built-in autotune and started to mess with it, somehow that turned into making some silly songs, later I started making beats because I couldn’t find the ones for me, but also because buying them was too expensive for a fifteen year old. Where do you find the inspiration to create music? Images. Either it’s something that I’ve shot or something I found or saved, more often than not it’s more than one photo, then I try to score it. What song / project would you suggest for unfamiliar listeners For now there’s only two songs, so I’d say to check them both out. What’s next for Patrick Hyacinth? What are some goals for 2025? More music, some beautiful visuals, and I really want to produce for other artists. What music have you been listening to recently? I recently discovered the band Prefab Sprout, I think the song “Bonny” is one of the most beautiful songs ever created. But I’ve been listening to Nala Sinephro, Toro Y Moi, Fleetwood Mac, Mount Kimbie and the first Mac Demarco album.

ARTIST SPOTLIGHT YNFRM19TH July 27th 2025 Describe your music for unfamiliar listeners My shi like gettin lyrical inna club — da beat, da females dancin, n da rappin got da nigs makin stank face. Describe your creative process Well one way u can tell is scraiGht from my fav prod 11azriel mouth — when I wus talkin to him one time in VC wit our li ones, I wus like damn gng Ian been able ta make shi, Ian feelin it. N da li ones wus like ahh dang yn, but azzy he wus like, it ainun u, gone get mad one day n come kill da beat. Your album, “Y19” has a really cool sound. What went into making it? Do you have a favorite song on it? Well one thing I can say about that is that was my vault at the time, so that wus just hella songs I never dropped. And 2 goes with it — everyday since around the new year of 2025, I joined the music reviews my guys at @theunitedunderground host. Everytime da main guy Mal would give input, I’d b like “bet, I gotchu next week, ima do wut u said inna next song.” Eventually he jus started fw da songs I dropped cus I polished it, and he wus like “Wea da links at bru, I can’t listen to u yn, ima need u to drop.” Yk, I would listen to da guy Mal input every week, so I wus like nig wut betden. Da week UnitedMasters took to drop it, I dropped all da songs inna vault and called it “Y19.” How’d you first get into making music? I got into music multiple ways tbh, but u can say the main first way wus bc my dad always loved his speakers and he would drive me around hoods bumpin hella music. I must have absorbed it — shoot, das prolly y I b yellin and got da loud 808s lmao. Where do you find the inspiration to create music? I don’t really get inspired — or u can say I fully get inspired by everything, howeva u see it. But me, dis jus my real life n I jus talk onna beat. Or u can ask people det kno me — deyll tell u my mind wanders hella. N coworkers a tell u how I use to write raps on receipts about us workin, howeva u see it. Also, a lot folks I fw passed away, n I hate they can’t see dis new shi I put out cus Dey fwm wen Dey wus alive. Ik das prolly a lil deep myf. What have you been working on lately? Any new music soon? Shoot, yk me man — I’m at work rn, wen I get off I might record. N weneva I do record gettin off work, I b up till 5–6 inna mornin, shi crazy. Ask ma dukes. Otha den det, I’m really workin on dese videos now doe. Da music kinda evolve on its own, but I been savin bread, gettin ready ta push dese videos. Dey finna go up — watch out, soon u gon see. Other than music, what else have you been up to? Shiii not shi — workin. Whoeva readin dese n u my age, iku feel dsshii. Answerin dese questions rn, finna have ta clock back in, break almost over. What music have you been listening to lately? Shi, if it’s not mine, den old lyrical music. It helps me widen my mind, n da beats remind me of my prod 11azriel. Like da only hard shi I can find det give Azzy competition is da old shi — like Bone Thugs, Pac, Eazy-E. But it makes sense cus Azzy da newest, newest futuristic even version of da old West Coast — tellin u, stop playin wit det boy Azzy.