Technology is proving to be both a blessing and a curse for creatives. For Lauren Hannan aka Yinyang she has embraced it in her DIY approach to producing her music, with its various tangents and offshoots. I had to find out more from this alternative hip-hop artist from Northern Ireland whose self-expression in her music is thrilling.
Welcome Yinyang. Congratulations on your single ‘Happy Money‘. To begin with can you expand on how you became an artist?
It’s something I always wanted to do but my confidence kept getting knocked, so I then ended up focusing on a career behind the scenes in music festivals and then had absolutely no time for anything else, it’s a pretty hectic job!
I ended up in New Zealand for work in November 2019 and met some incredibly inspiring humans, one of which asked me what I really want to do, and why am I not doing it. I had no concrete answer, so that set everything in motion. Then I came back to the UK in March 2020, we went straight into lockdown where I lost my job and suddenly had all this time, so sat down at my laptop and learnt how to use GarageBand and worked on the project all day every day. I’m pretty obsessed with it now and have taken a step away from work to pursue it.
You are Belfast- born and London-based. Why did you move to London? How have you settled in?
I was actually born in a wee town just outside Belfast called Ballymena, but it’s easier to say Belfast! I moved to London when I finished uni to seek out the music industry in some way and I’ve settled in far too well, been here for about 7 years now on and off. Although I’m about to move back home for a while to get my head down and prepare for next year, and free rent is always appreciated.
I understand you have a million and one ideas covering music, film, video games and more! Can you describe what being creative means to you? And at times are you overflowing with ideas, or do you love the myriad of possibilities?
It’s cool but it’s torturous sometimes, it’s ADHD on crack, and there’s no one to reign me in!
My brain is always hectically full of mad ideas, and I think because I can see the future of YINYANG I get so excited about it. I have it all planned out, and the possibilities keep coming which is really exciting, but I just need to find the time! I’m totally diy so the music and live show is the most important right now, then I’ll move on to the next steps when the time is right.
In my opinion being creative is one of the coolest things we can do, to have an idea and make it reality in whatever form you want it to be; that self-expression and exploration is so much fun. For me to be fully creative I need to have the blinkers on, deep dive, go ghost for a while and try not to let my inner critic kill me.
‘Happy Money‘ is your fifth single and you designed individual Pokémon cards to accompany each song. Are their further plans to pull these songs together?
Yes! One of the initial mad ideas! The playing cards will be the first to come out, each single has it’s own character card as the artwork, soon you’ll be able to collect them and play them like an ode to Pokemon. Every song is connected whether it’s through the cards or lyrical references but there are plans to pull the songs together at some point!
‘Happy Money‘ explored more personal themes. You combine hip-hop beats with industrial soundscapes and a strong passionate vocal. How do you create songs? Does the music or the lyrics come first?
It really depends on my state at the time, sometimes it’s the beat and sometimes it’s the lyrics. With ‘Happy Money‘ I wrote verse 1 and 2 years ago and I used to play them on acoustic guitar as a different song, these lyrics were written when I first started to realise my mental health might not be all good. Then in lockdown I got prescribed Sertraline, and that’s where the rest of the song came out. When I was writing ‘Happy Money‘ I remembered the verses and they had to be it, in some way it felt mad to have the two versions of me writing about the same thing but different timelines in my life. Hopefully you can hear the darkness in the verses and the almost coming to terms with it playfulness in the chorus and raps.
What are your plans for the rest of 2022?
I’m currently working like a dawg on my live show to make it the best it can be, I’ve made a full light show for it which looks unreal, so will be playing more shows for suuuuuure.
Got another release coming before the years out, and I’m also writing new material to be out in 2024, working on some collaborations and prepping for next years madness whatever that might be, and making sure I’m ready for it.
If I looked in your fridge right now what would I find?
Aw Jesus, it’s not looking great in there. There’s a lot of wine, oat milk, some cornichons (a weird but great snack for writing), veg and a milky bar yoghurt for later yuuuuum.
For more information on Yin Yang please check facebook website and instagram.
