 What's up? If you're just joining us, this is Rock to a Live right here on Y254 TV, the hashtag is Rock to a 254. We are on Facebook as Y254, we have a post document below where are you watching from? Represent your hood. What do you want to listen to? I told you, if you already know who our guests are, send through the questions. There are so many of you are waiting for them, they are here. They are already here, but I'm super super excited, oh my god, don't hate me, I'm literally such a fan of the band, so they're like, oh my god, what's wrong with that nunner? But the guys are here, I'm so excited that they're here, first of all, they're Kenya's sweetheart, especially the Roxin, according to their Roxin, they can never do any wrong. I'm serious, I'm not even playing. There are a seven piece band, a metal course, seven piece band right here from Nairobi, Kenya, ladies and gentlemen, give it up for L. Now every single day, I know most of you know this, like every single day when you're playing anything, or if you have any news from you guys, when I talk about LAT, I say it like four times, I'm always like L-I-T-L, because from everything we're hanging out at an event, every time you're done playing, guys always want more, so I'm always chanting that L-I-T-L, you know, so I always find myself saying it so many times, I just keep going on and on and on. All right, now, you were here last time, Diallo was here, Ted was here, she was not here. Yeah, but you're back. Shukrani Sana? Yeah, you're almost welcome. Yeah, you're almost welcome, I didn't even know where to start, I'm just like, okay, all right, cool. But we're going to do this, we got this, right guys, we got this, okay, cool. All right, now, I think we're going to just start from back then, like you are not even here, because the last time you guys came, you were still very young, you're just getting started, the show hadn't peaked. So for the guys at home, I think we're just going to get you from the start, like you never came to the show. But I'm going to start with the introduction first, you can introduce yourself and then Ted is going to do the same as well as Di, for the guys at home to, for those who don't know you to, yeah, get acquainted. So my name is Devin Borough, I'm the lead singer, I do the scrimmage. Yeah. But more guys from the same know me as Cheezy, yeah. Right. I think that was much better when you said hash vocals. And then Ted comes in with a clean vocal. Yeah, the clean vocals, yeah. Oh, you can introduce, sorry. Carry on. Yeah. Yes, so I do the clean vocals, but as maybe many people have, or whoever has listened to the album right now has been saying that we've all evolved in a particular way, so I also do a bit of the scrimmage, thanks to my good colleague, to show me how to do it. Yes, I do clean vocals and I'm also a calling singer. Right. And I thought you were just getting started on the hash vocals. You never lose your voice when you're doing it, like maybe you can't talk the next day. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Chatting for like a busy career student in town. Yeah. That's how I chat. Yeah, it's quite crazy, but I'd say like in the earlier, when we were starting out as a band, the hash vocals were very hard to do. Yeah. Because you do like one song, I'm at two songs, Eve, like the guys are not helping me out, like in terms of the backup vocals. Yeah, right. It's hard, because your voice, like after two songs, three songs, because... Your voice is done. Yeah, you're still learning. Yeah. So after the experience, I think right now, we're at a place, they've been challenging me, we've been challenging each other. Yeah. So, yeah, it grows on you. But yes, you do lose your voice sometimes. Yeah. But you become much better after practice. Yeah, we practice. Just practice, yeah. And as you say, the evolving, yeah. Yeah. Right. Cool. And then we have... Yes. My name is Diallo. Everyone just calls me D. D. Yeah, right. So yes, I am the rhythm guitarist for last year's tragedy. Also co-founder with yours truly, Cheezy. Cheezy. Yes. Yeah. Cheezy is one of my fans, but I'll be talking to him all about that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's all in character. You know? And funny enough, he's one who keeps a low profile, you get? Yeah. Yeah. So his name is Diallo. Well, we said when we were studying the interview, there's seven of you. So maybe you can introduce the other guys who are not here. Yeah. So, of course, for the guys who are not here, they're probably watching from home or from other places at work. Yeah. Yeah. So we have Maya Motua, who is our bassist. We have Bruto Kipkule, who is our excellent, brilliant keyboardist. And we have George Azula, who is our drummer. Oh, okay. And then we have, last but not least, Joseph Fongonya, who is our lead guitarist. Lead guitarist. Lead guitarist. Yes. And you are the rhythm guitarist. Yeah, I'm the rhythm guitarist. I am technically the lazy one. Yeah. I am the lazy one. Yes. Yeah, it's a professional choice. A lazy one. He does all the heavy lifting, yeah. No, no, no, no. It takes a whole bunch. It does. You know, if you are not part of the band, there'll be something missing. So definitely everybody plays an important role. Yeah. But since we said we're going to start from the start, so let's get started from where it all began. It all began in campfires. So whose idea was it to form a band? I can only imagine. A very long time ago. Almost 10 years or 10 years. More than 10 years. I'm embarrassed to say. Yeah. I'm actually embarrassed. So I want to remember. So this is how it actually started. It's a very funny story. And maybe cheese you will fill in the gap. So at the time, I know when I joined, of course I was really in, even at the time I was really into rock and metal music. I didn't even know how to play an instrument. Probably still can't. Wow, really? So what happened is, I mean, one day at Star University, and if everyone knows, Star University happens to be a small conservative university. So the people who listen to rock music tend to stand out. Yeah. Just by virtue of the shots you wear and everything. So I remember during induction, cheesy approach me. Yeah, because I think I was wearing a mud-veined t-shirt. Right. It's like, hey, you look cool. You don't see any of those around you, guys. You like rock music, I'm guessing. And I was just like, yeah, who is this weirdo. But yeah, it's like, I have some friends who we just met, and they all like the same sort of music and stuff. If you want to hang out with us guys, we go skateboarding. Yeah. Yeah, so come and hang out. So literally, that is what started the seed that grew the brand. So because we, I mean, we hang out with guys and we used to, I mean, after our classes, or even during mid-classes, we'd sneak out and go to one person's room, I guess, off campus and just go watch music videos. Like the latest music videos, which I guess on those days were- Can you imagine? Yeah. Whatever your things, like you left school. I don't know. I don't know if you go out. But you're listening. You're watching music. Can you imagine? You're watching music. I mean, it used to be such a huge number of guys. I mean, at the time, it looked huge. So like about 10, 15 guys. Yeah. Stuck into one small, one big sit-up. Just watching the CDs. And we wrote music videos that someone had banned from us and banned from CD. And yeah, we just- Fun times. It sounds so amazing. You've been just talking about it. And now the band is formed. What was their ambition? Like now we have a band. So what did you have in mind? Like in terms of the band, where did you want to see yourself as a band? To be honest, probably we were mirroring the bands we were listening to at the time. So all of us were inspired. And like, say, we wanted to go on tour. You know, we're here. We're watching DVDs. We're like, oh, these guys are having so much fun. We- let's put out just good music and true music and learn as we go. And as you heard when Diablo was coming, I didn't know even how to scream myself. Right. Yeah. So it was a whole- But you determined. Learning process. Yeah. And used to scream actually. Used to scream better. But he taught me also some friends we just learned off of each other. And also there's the old scene, the old Kenan rocks scene. Wiyathi, the guys for hip-hop and wapi, us guys had Wiyathi. We used to meet up for shows. Actually they used to go for shows earlier than before even we met up. Right. But also we used to go there. So basically what we wanted for LIT is just to make good music and probably someday go on tour or just inspire people. Right. Because you know as- and I'll repeat that again it's evolving. It's all about evolving. So we used to meet ourselves a lot to the other bands. But as we grew and as we are still growing we've come up I think with our own identity our own style, our own signature. I feel like every other artist has that an identity crisis. When you immediate something you tend to be just like them. So when you release music you sound like them. They're like, oh you sound a lot more like here. So I get that. So you evolved and became you now. LIT who now inspire other younger bands. We're going to be talking about that. I'll tell you about all the bands you inspire. But now I want you to know about your first gig. Because imagine this is like ten years ago. Oh my goodness. Tell me about that. You see first of all you're based on people don't know about Max Hall. You guys are here. Can we really talk about that? Can we really talk about our first gig? He's going to dig it up. Our first gig I think our official first gig was within Deistar. Deistar actually. Yeah it was within Deistar. The Amphitheater. And it was a fundraiser for I guess the guy who Joshu. Yeah I mean he was in charge of Tuck Shop or whatever. So you all wanted to perform. Yes. No one liked it so much. But it was only a way to get people to listen to us anyway. So yeah that was our first gig. And I can't for the love of me even explain how bad that was. But at the same time I think it gave us it gave us the motivation to do more and want to play more in front of people. Because I mean we knew we didn't sound as great. But the crowd who was there just immediately we were done. They were all our friends. They were like you suck but yeah. Yeah exactly. So thanks to them. Thanks to them. The reason we're here 12-13 years later because their support is the reason that us guys decided to keep going. Yeah that's dope. And even back then not even then right now is securing a sport to even play metal. It's still a challenge. Now off-campus we're still catching up right. Now we're going to go to the album just a little bit after this. But now I can imagine right now it's still hard to book a space. So how was it then like off-campus you're on a poster. Not even just like oh come see us you're on an official poster. How challenging was it getting a place to play and how were guys like how would people view you. I think we had the advantage of like cheesy side it's the reality. So there was an underground movement that to be honest these days the waves that we've been catching and surfing them. There was an underground movement where we ended up in some weird garage and then they said oh my god this thing is real and people love this music and they mosh. So what we I think from there we followed them up and so every time there was a gig we followed. Every time we came friends with them and they realized oh there's something here these guys are doing that is actually worth presenting to other people and push their agenda now in terms of building the rock scene and that's how we ended up following gig after gig Razora. Back and forth until now. And here we are in 2021 still doing this. It's amazing there's so many people who actually give up on their dreams like you start and then even you guys have careers. But then that does not interrupt your music life. Someone will leave that and say oh this thing isn't working out then they'll stop and concentrate on their career but I'm so glad you all are still here just like inspiring other people. So speaking of inspiration I think everybody has their favorite I want to know who inspired you back in the day everybody has that one band like you look at this guy perform those videos you are watching you're like oh this guy how can you do that I just need to practice. It doesn't look like what are you doing? The local bands most of them were from the expatriate schools so those were from the muslims and what not and that's how we got used to them so a lot of punk and ska bands but for metal metal is what we used to watch I guess from youtube or online at the time so wow the bands what's the one I don't know if you can list one of them for sure I don't know how you knew a whole array of bands I'd say but mostly I think is when we were starting off in uni the bands like I think every individual in the band has their preference probably for me it was more of screamo kind of emo funeral for a friend under oath and they to remember confined just like super melodic stuff remember the door codes I think we have the same I'm a melody sucker anything melodic probably a love locally I'd say also I get inspired by people Ted also before we had LIT these guys had a band called and they used to go for their gigs and I'm like what these guys are muscaring then later on we formed now LIT so I think my band inspired me also to give me also motisha also the other bands Akina Dan say guys for the scene who like you really have had time to sit with them and create also with them in the studio or share ideas Dan, Rafo Samua Roy from Rush Akina Hughes, Seismic Niko personally I've been inspired by vocalist only at a guitarist I'm like what the melody can change I can do something better locally the scene has really inspired because we are more of a communal community people are not meeting as much as we were back in the day we had commitments with Jobo but I'd say locally yes guys have inspired me and internationally of course do you want to add or to add if you're asking about inspiration I think us guys and the reason our music sounds the way it do because we really really got into it and we really came together at a certain time when metalcore was really coming into it there were more than 10 the 10 bands I can think of but I mean communally we all like so I'll just name a few so of course you have to put Azalee dying there there was Kill Switch Engage you put a trio in there Parkway Drive yeah all that made yeah Caliban, I can't forget about those guys a funeral for a friend and I think they had the biggest influence you know in terms of our music oh great I don't want to keep talking about evolving I want to know about that I mean since you're first maybe EP until now I'm still hired how can you say you've evolved not just vocally but let's talk about that I think I'd say the creative writing process about music it's really changed actually we were talking about it with Diallo earlier our first EP was called Damnation of the Week actually we released it and this is Nini and this is my space back in the day and fun enough we actually recorded it at the Kenyan National Theater that's back in what 2006 2007 yeah why are you guys laughing it took a long time it took a long time I'd say then we had I took my part in your flow we hadn't gotten the flow really nicely after that I think we released a few songs there and like went through various studios Radio Africa, Akina, Stevo but actually we didn't get the sound really we wanted so when challenge came up, challenge accepted EP I think that's when we triggered something in us we were like oh there's a particular sound we are feeling there's a bounce in it when you skizz a song like Elephant Generation Challenge accepted much from the underground there was a kind of growth in terms of both the writing process coming together and more so the quality of the recording because a long time ago people didn't really know how to record live music a lot of our proficient guys used to do it but when it comes to rock music it will be hard for them I think even up to date even right now, rock is different even a really good producer will really struggle recording rock music I don't know if guys would want to add on to something because about the evolution growth in terms of life many of us we're just waiting for that call they'll call us and then we're touring what actually happened was that many of us evolved life wise like Chizi mentioned earlier many of us got jobs, many of us started our careers people are families so we said there are families there are so many amkons there are amkons now when amkons lions comes and that evolution has also allowed us to evolve how we like he said, write our music because the things that we feel like we need to talk about or there's a way we feel like we should express ourselves there's a way we feel like even as where I was in 2008 the fanboy is not who I am right now and the music now I think amkons lions speaks volumes about how many of us have really really grown evolution has come in our album before we even talk now about the album there are so many other bands that are in the scene now the rock scene in Kenya it has grown what do you think about that what do you think of the young bands I honestly couldn't be more excited now I know we've been here for a long time someone made a joke we've been here for 3 lectures about 3 lectures I didn't know how you feel about that that's good, I mean when we started and I think that's one of the things personally I was always inspired because of watching bands play I wanted to play so we wanted to put ourselves in a position through hard work like if we could just inspire that one person to pick up a guitar or drumsticks and honestly that's all you have for it they've been here Bizarro was here last year and he was like before he started singing I would just look at him and I would be like oh my god I want to be like him there's a lot of money to say good things we need to start we need to start you inspire so many guys I'm sure whatever you're doing your album is really really nice so I was telling you guys before we even started the interview so when you do something like that someone else will want to top that because you've already said that bar way too high so they just can't do mediocre if I look up to you I want to be like you so that's really nice and this album I'm talking about I'm not going to lie I just dropped my goodness yesterday no it was Thursday guys I've been waiting for this album for nearly a decade I'm not even playing 7 years so how did you know it was time because I know you are holding on to it for the longest time it's not perfect yet that's what I'm just thinking so how did you know it was time okay fine we gotta let her go he's grown now how did you know I guess we'll go this way so it's complicated because honestly this album should have maybe come out maybe 2 or 3 years ago according to our plan and we started recording honestly in around 2018 but the studios andromeda where we were currently recording I think the owners of the studio they shut it down so our producer and very good friend to the band told him he brought us together and asked if we could trust him because he was going to set up a studio in his house which is all the way in march of course which took a while so that delayed when we finally got ready we started recording again and we knew that we were going to release this in 2020 and then boom Covid you know and honestly to be in many ways I'm actually grateful because what happened is in that span of time that we didn't release this we we've really grown and even the way we wanted to communicate and articulate the things in the songs have changed so a lot of the work that we did especially last year when it comes to rewriting the songs is because we just felt this needs to be a bit more fresher it needs to be a bit more current so the audience deserves to listen to the best version of ourselves then among us lions happened before we even respond to that you got to tell us about the title how did that come about I feel like we should have a smoking pipe yes so again it's been really inspired by everybody bringing their own element of their lives to come together the idea of amongst lions is a bit of a duality so it's like recognize that I think you're in a jungle of lions and you have to be aware that you need to be one as well while at the same time be proud of the fact that for our band we are amongst lions and so we thought we should have a magnum opus we should really say we are amongst lions but at the same time share the message that people should be aware that they are amongst lions we can be one too so shizy can tell us about their album names who comes up with those names have you ever heard about that they just play the helium they just intercess it the names there are so many oh him he has something really cool we come up with the names even before we write the songs yeah so it's really cool and the way I personally and shizy I know will expound on the songwriting process is that when we started writing the album there are some songs content wise we knew we wanted to talk about so even before I started playing just jamming a riff or whatever and I'm just like ok what's the coolest representation of what we want to talk about and maybe this is a fast to the audience do people know that there are three songs in the album are technically one song so red dwarf perihelion and afelion and perihelion perihelion and afelion are literally just one long song we should do a play so yeah we just think of cool names sometimes when we are jamming you know someone like Maya let's call this song this and the song is not even laid out completely yet and then of course when we go to record we have to fine tune everything but most of the time we come up with the name of songs even before we have a song itself you talked about content and songwriting so this is going to be for shizy 11 tracks on the album what are some of the issues you've tackled in the album in those 11 tracks especially given that it's 2021 so many issues 2021 I can touch on a few songs because it depends there are some songs we released earlier mamoth, perihelion pounds of flesh yeah that's it I didn't know sometimes it's so high level the message it's the message is very different in all of the tracks and what I really like also is to challenge people to read the lyrics because what I noted is there's a way I'll do a song he'll write a song or Diallo will write a song I'm going to interrupt you on that one I think they tried having the lyrics but then you're like what does that mean you really need but then you don't get it you're like okay I get the lyrics but then I still don't get it there's one that speaks about it was talking about hell and they think heaven or something perihelion so I'm like I go through the lyrics okay of course it's not literally but then or is it open to one's interpretation you nailed it they come on from what I've gotten with working with these guys they love to live they use a lot of allegory and you know, you know, you know, you know, you know and we want to leave that to the audience to make the decision about what the song is however, that being said, there are different themes amongst lines like 47, you can give examples 47 is definitely us guys, because we are Kenyans I thought they were with me it's not that they love me they don't like me 47 can't be anything to me it's definitely a very politically leaning song you can't be Kenyan and not care about politics unless you're part of the problem obviously we come out very strongly and say how we feel about it the perihelions of this world you know, some of them have to do with you know, mental health issues and how people cope with grief themselves depression and I'm glad you guys touched on that because I keep talking about this here and depression is really affecting people we just saw the other story on the news this kid who killed five of his family members and then blamed this in a movie and I was thinking it's deeper than that because when someone talks about depression but when you talk about depression you get so I feel like it's about time we address that we have to talk about this deeper and you guys are doing that in songs and just, you know and guys listen to that so I guess that and you featured Rich most of us love her how was it working with her and how did you know she's the one you wanted to work with on the album yeah so we've been friends with Rich for a very long time we used to cover the scene talk about the scene really push the scene in terms of her articles articles in ZUKA in other platforms and when she decided to become an artist of course we were very supportive and welcome come struggle with us for our talk yeah actually a funny fact we are with her in primary we are new with it later on in life wait we are in primary school together you know in the same class actually wow okay that's really dope like mind blowing so her appreciation of the scene as much as we do it's about growing the scene for most of us and then we got fortunate with Andromeda who was working together with yeah with Rich as well yeah she worked there and then they were like yeah you know what should be a good idea but Diallo I'll tell you I knew I knew I mean we are very humble to hear from you about but other bands look up to us yeah we do we look up to Rich she's such an amazing artist and it's all the time we fought together that Rokas go to primary school yeah you know you know like sometimes I'll have an interview like how you guys are here and then we're just talking and then you'll find some comments like oh I said you are Kenya Queen yeah what do you mean nothing like that okay there's this stereotype like Rokas are cool kids how can a primary year went to group of schools and stuff no Miss Kaksima, primary I thought you were kids but you're cool yeah I'm not a mutual ex just like any other kid but cool yeah right so like one of the songs that we love also in the album is their lesion we're going to be playing it also after the interview I want to know the making of that video what you guys have seen it how was that first of all how long did it take and how was it making it because the video is sick like what and editing it's a perfection so I want to know about that it took a whole day it took a whole day man like I said this last 10 years I've taken a toll on our knees next this is why you don't see us in most hits anymore look at that can you imagine what you can say about the making of the video it was fun I'd start with that first it's the first video I think we've done off of us guys creating ourselves because most of the videos we've done them ourselves and with our friends yeah so the making of the video it was fun it was a lot of fun I don't know what to say we had the advantage of being very close to the director called David Mashare and the videographer Mike so they were friends before anything also in the scene growing the scene together so for them they knew our tone, our voice the vision we had and then we kept we were able to build off of them with that proposal and this swimming pool situation you know so they were like why don't we do this thing and they were so efficient in setting it up we actually didn't feel a lot of struggle we just contributed what we wanted in the vision and they were like yeah let's handle it and David and Mike did the job and when we went there we were there so it was the video had a journey I guess I enjoyed it and I feel like when the time comes to do more it will definitely be about that right so of course definitely we play favourites right like I play favourites even you put me on the spot so I gotta do this I need everybody's favourite on the album I know Nellie and me I'm glad you guys need to be fired so when I get to you when we are live I'm gonna start with Cheezy to be honest I'm feeling aphelion aphelion and I've always told them but also listening to the album there's some songs which are growing on me so I'm super confused but let me just say aphelion for the sake of just aphelion for the sake of the arguments I'm feeling all the songs because it has a different kind of vibe and mood so if you want the heavy I can go to Akina Violation in medias if I want the soft soft intercessor hardly there are different songs which personally like trigger something different in me so yeah I think it's a simple we are discussing that with me here I don't know you guys I know but it's hard pretty much the same thing I think we have so many songs and that's a beautiful thing about lions each lion is different and I'd like to think we have 11 class of them for you to experience and I passed as I was 47 maybe it's just the stanzas and something I just did with that guitar that was fantastic it was very fun and I happened to just walk into the practice whatever and find them they are doing it and I was like what are you guys doing these are songs I'll say 47 Perihelion and Aphelion now you're going to pick one just one they don't like that Perihelion this is easy it's not a bias of course I have to say thank you to the actual lead singers of this band because they allowed me to write a song and actually sing on a song so thread level midnight that is my favorite song everybody is different it's a whole album we love the whole album but everybody has a different favorite I like that now as we wind up I want to know like I told you many guys look up to you and there are some guys who are watching at home 2020 was really hard on everyone across the world any message of hope just to the guys at home do you have anything you can tell that might be wind up such a cheesy I'll just say because as you said it's been hard for everyone I've had their personal or individualistic journeys so my experiences may not be necessarily yours but I'll just say keep on what you're doing be good be a better person and be a better person who adds value to the other people around you because I don't know what else to say it's hard because I can say do this but you have to just keep on what you see is bad keep what is good learn learn learn and be better and add value to people cool that's amazing I like that he's taking all the good parts it's hard to talk back same here I know many people say life is short but I like to also say that life is long and this album has taught us that life is long it's very long it's very less to get here to get here is growth and it requires you like Cheesy has said you have to be a person of value to find people of value and believe that if you put hard work into something that you believe in despite whatever is happening you can be able to get where you are going or where the universe wants to take you where you should be the music also speaks for itself it's very don't give up and I think none of us actually gave up when it was very easy for us to just say we are done and just believe that you have what it takes to get to where you are going mine is very simple and that's why Evan wrote that song because there is one just be empathetic everyone is going through a struggle that you possibly couldn't know be kind to others and also be kind to yourself most importantly, be kind to yourself he said empathetic not a pushover though don't be a pushover because of time you will tell us the social media handles where people can find you and maybe Cheesy can tell us where the album is available for the guys looking to buy you will tell us for cheap people there of course follow us on all our social media pages we are on twitter which is last year's tragedy we are on facebook last year's tragedy and on instagram we are L-Y-T we are underscore L-Y-T cool the guys because it's been 7 years guys I don't think the album is expensive so you can spread so money just to buy the album where are they buying it from I think we have 3 platforms we will probably deal with them if I live out one Bandcamp last year's tragedy we are on Spotify and on iTunes iTunes, Spotify we are mostly streaming I think almost all platforms we are streaming we are streaming on platforms like Bandcamp guys can listen for free but they cannot download you have to buy if you want to download you have to purchase but you can go listen for free you can stream it speaking of streaming you can stream the show live that is at whitefeather.ca that was amazing but we still have other staff to come up we have to stick around for that she has another new segment she is going to be sharing with us in a few of the hashtags that was amazing next time you are coming you have to perform for us I would love that once we fix that you all can come through and just perform so guys at home can have an experience those who have never come through for gigs they can see what we see when we go out there keep it white 2 3 4 right about now Violation Bye