Tim Levinson – Managing Director, Elefant Traks & Artist

Tim Levinson is a rare beast. He’s won awards as an artist, the acts he represents have taken out trophies, and last year the label he runs bagged one. This year, he deserves an award for longevity – the label he guides, Elefant Traks, is celebrating its 15^th anniversary.

Elefant Traks last year won the Australian Independent Music Award for best independent label, on a night when he gave an insightful speech into the indies business Down Under. The label Levinson co-founded in 1998 reached a new level of critical acclaim when its signing Hermitude took out the Australian Music Prize with HyperParadise, becoming the first electronic instrument album to win the coveted prize. Levinson is a star in his own right, as the recording artist Urthboy and as a founding member of hip hop outfit the Herd.

TMN caught up with Levinson to learn how he juggles his work and his thoughts on the state of hip hop in Australia.

When you won the Australian Independent Music Award for label of the year, did that feel like justification?

We’ve always been an artist-run collective that was set up to facilitate DIY music. It still is. The fact that so many years later, when AIR decided they would acknowledge labels in what is usually only reserved for artists, was great. I was probably more stoked winning that than winning an artist award the year before as it felt like a nice tribute to everyone involved – not just one band or person.

How do you split your time between running the company, and being creative?

The roles of being an artist and working the managerial roles for an artist or of the label require complete compartmentalisation of those different roles. It’s always an evolving process. On one level, it gives me a great grounding and understanding of what’s going on for artists, some of which require that extra familiarity with their processes and what they’re going through. On the other side, as an artist who’s also involved in the fields of music that I manage, it requires a great separation of my own irrational artistic expectations. Sure, I’d love to be a star and finally break it. You’d be hard pressed to find an artist who didn’t have some small pocket of their mind that held out hope for something like that. In order to enjoy work and that other side of the business, I had to really learn to press the mute button on some of those little voices that creep in as an artist.

Elefant Traks roster isn’t entirely hip hop.

The label was started because there weren’t labels catering to our vision of electronic music and hip hop. But we do have a lane – it’s just pretty wide and the drivers don’t obey the road rules. We don’t put out rock ‘n’ roll or indie pop. We have electronic instrumental music, soul driven electronic music and predominantly hip hop. We have tried to stay true to the spirit with which we started, which is a ragtag of jokers, guns and dreamers. I think we’re home to a few geniuses too. Even though we’ve focused and honed in on our speciality, we certainly don’t have a purist hip hop approach to things.

This year is your 15th in business. Any key milestones along the way?

It’s not characterised by significant moments as much as there is a ruthless determination not to die. There’s a continual energy that accumulates with each year – as opposed to it waning. We’re not a subsidiary of another label, we’re not underwritten by another business; it’s just been about hanging in there for those 15 years. The secret, if any, of our success is “hanging in there”. Funnily enough, the model that has evolved with our label is one in which we’ve provided management services for our artists. It’s not because we’re trying to control their rights, it’s purely because many of them haven’t had managers and it’s a pragmatic step in doing the job right. Or close to right. As artists become more sophisticated, more popular, get a big following, you have to start concentrating the services you provide. We don’t manage everybody anymore. Subsequently the acts we do manage get better service. What we’re seeing is that other labels have taken on a similar approach, not because they’re copying us, but because our instinctive approach suits the times. Lucky I guess.

When might we see an Aussie act go to America and really cut through?

It’s hard to say this without the long story. Years ago the hip hop scene here was born out of a sense of weird patriotism. There was a moment called ‘Support Australian Hip Hop’ and it had a logo. We never had anything to do with it, but we benefited from the indirect enthusiasm that grew with it. That mentality has grown and it made sense when everything was so cottage. It felt like it was really part of solidifying the community here. Now it’s so big you have artists selling out 10,000 tickets in Australian cities, numerous #1s and multi-Platinum records. It’s a serious business. It’s more than just a style of music now; it’s something where people are drawn to this music because it says something about themselves. To get why Australian hip hop is so popular is to try and understand Australians and our collective psyche. As far as what happens internationally, there’s not one part of my mind with any shadow of a doubt on whether local hip hop artists are going to succeed internationally – just depends on the scale. There’s a lack of pretension that offers an alternative to the grand scale hyper-reality of American hip hop. We’re busily writing our own story and consolidating a really powerful section of this market over here. And that’s probably what needs to happen before it properly launches oversees. In Australia, the commercial end of the industry ignores Indigenous hip hop, but it’s short-sighted because they offer one of the most intriguing stories for international audiences to latch onto.

Is the term ‘Skip Hop’ a problem?

I don’t know a single hip hop artist here who doesn’t cringe at that. You don’t’ say, “I’m an Aussie rock and roll artist”. You say, “I’m a rock artist.” We have made the bed and we have to now sleep in it. We have retail stores here with ‘skip hop’ sections. The ‘Support Australian Hip Hop’ movement has had consequences no one could predict. And it’s pretty unfortunate.

It’s been a dreadful year for hip hop festivals. What’s your take on it?

It’s one of those things where a few incidents happen and it blows out of proportion. It feeds into a greater issue that is the fluctuating fortunes of the live environment. Through the last five or 10 years, festivals have risen to a peak and maybe we’re seeing a correction in that. A whole lot of festivals – not just hip hop festivals – are cancelling. Big Day Out sales are flat, this year was meant to be the year they had a big return. You just can’t stack these bills with enough big name acts to interest the audiences anymore, because every festival has these great artists. It’s like downloading records; if you can get everything, it takes away the excitement of the purchase or the experience in a lot of ways. Anytime a festival brand has a long run, it’s almost on them to reinvent themselves – at least at this point in time.

You recently said on Twitter, you have more followers from France than New Zealand.

Most Australian music can’t get a record in the store in New Zealand, but we’ve got a great appreciation of NZ artists, so much so that we claim them once they’re successful. There’s a funny back and forth, but it’s nothing too serious. It’s just that NZ doesn’t support at all any of my livelihood. Every now and then you take it personally.

Hermitude had a single licensed to Parlophone imprint Regal in the U.K. What did you make of that experience?

It was interesting, firstly because we’re an independent and Parlophone isn’t. As soon as it wasn’t immediately playlisted by Radio 1 they just dropped everything. Amazing. We had a great personal connection with the A&R, which was a positive experience. It’s just another reminder about what exactly we are doing with our artists and it renewed our sense of purpose. Hermitude winning the Australian Music Prize was the first time an award like that was given to an instrumental electronic record, which shows that things are changing over here. Electronic music is going through a beautiful period at the moment but it’s littered with producers who have no performance experience – it’s hard to imagine the public retaining an interest in a style of music that is short on personality and showmanship. It’s one of those areas where electronic music perhaps is left wanting a little bit. An act like Hermitude have been in bands since they were kids and it’s really exciting seeing their attention to live performance propelling them so far above their peers.

It’s the label’s 15^th anniversary. How will you celebrate it?

Parties! I think these things need to be shared for anyone connected with the label – whether it’s our artists or their friends and family, or punters and audiences who’ve become friends. I’m really proud of our roster – we’re multi-cultural, we’re Indigenous, we’re male and female. We’re more than just the bastions of Australian music: the middle class white male! For us to build something that’s meaningful, it goes above and beyond just trying to structure our little label as if it were trying to become a little empire. We are a business but life’s too short to stoop to a narrow-minded view of market expectations – that’s just too fucking boring. I don’t really care about us doing these shows to make a whole bunch of money and to find a new way of setting up a new mini festival. I want for us to work really hard and support artists who I think are making really important records and contributing to how we really understand ourselves and communicating our identity.