Lowman Iowdown

The reason why Lowman's name might not be that familiar in SA is most probably due to the fact that he has been striving to make a name for himself in the US of A from 2009 till not too long ago. When a visa renewal proved too tricksy, he was forced to head back to home ground.

"Yeah, like any South African in America we have to renew visas when the time comes and for some reason I couldn't renew the visa in America so I had to fly back and stand on South African soil to submit all the paperwork and it was such a pain 'cause plane tickets are ridiculously expensive - and it happened at the most inconvenient time in my career there. Nothing about the situation was ideal.

You know, the month before I came back all my hard work and hustling, and sleeping in 24-hour diners in Santa Monica had all started to pay off. I was getting contacted for gigs and places like the Viper Room were booking me. To have a place in New York or LA, like that's always been the idea and it still is the idea, but that being said, I'm actually kinda happy that I started here in SA - it's my country, my family and my friends are here, so I don't regret anything that happened. I'm having a really good time."

Back to The Future and The Kardashians

And luckily it wasn't all sleeping in 24-hour diners as Lowman explained; when he was in the States he accomplished a fair amount. From being signed for a one-album deal with Authentik Artists, to having his EP produced by Mark Needham (who has worked with Fleetwood Mac and The Killers), to having his songs played on a few high-profile TV placements, Lowman was slowly but surely spreading his sound.

"It was amazing and kinda surreal [to work with Mark Needham] 'cause he phoned me just before I landed and said he wanted to meet up. He's a bit like Doc from Back to The Future you know, that scatty weird professor, and he was exactly like that. He ran around the studio and had all these bright ideas. He was fantastic and I'm still in touch with him on a friend basis. I hope I can work with again at some stage."

One of those high-profile TV placements was for the infamous Kardashians in an episode of Kourtney and Khloe Take Miami.

"In the States it's a lot easier to get into that field of the industry 'cause you meet all these music super writers. Their sole job is to find music for these shows and they met me once and got hold of the EP, fell in love with it and that song was perfect for that episode. I think it was the Season 2 finale and it literally was Scott crying on the bed holding his kid's shoe or something, and my song started playing in the background. It was awkwardly arousing."

A colourful smorgasbord of sound

Not deterred by his visa setback Lowman continued his hard-working hustle in South Africa. Signed with Universal Artists, the first thing on the to-do-list was to record his first full-length album. Luckily, the Grammy Award-winning Daryl Torr was available to assist at his Openroom Studios in Joburg. A few months later, "Crayon Boxes" was born, inspired by his life and his love of an eclectic mix of sounds.

"The inspiration is always the same, it's me and my life, the different situations and the people I meet - and I use that as a sorta artistic outlook. I suppose the title "Crayon Boxes" came from a very early age: I have always associated music and sound with colour. So if a song is in a certain key I would see a certain colour; it has always been so vivid and right there in front of me, this smorgasbord of colours in terms of the different genres of the songs. So I thought it reminded me of those old-school Crayola boxes you love as a kid, so that's where I got the inspiration for the title."

So what would be his favourite song off the album and what colour would that be?

"That's a good question. Choosing a favourite track is tricky 'cause it changes all the time, but for me at the moment it's a track called Suzy. Just because it's me and the guitar and I recoded it live in one take, and it was quite an emotional song. That song would be like a dark yellowy colour, like a nice wood grain. I think we need to invent a word for that colour ... "

So what's next for Lowman? Well now that the album is out he's focussing on local touring as well as already planning album number two.

"Touring, doing shows, meeting fans and getting more fans hopefully. And then album number two. I've already written so many more songs, so I'm just dying to get those on a record as well. And now being a bit more comfortable with the recording process I'm pretty confident that album number two is gonna be better."

Quickfire questions

If your music was an animal, what would it be and why?

Like a really cool fish eagle because he can just go anywhere, fly left right up and down and that's kinda me. I never really choose what direction to go in so I'm kinda covering it all. Some blues, a little bit of pop, a little bit of the depressing singer/songwriter vibes. So there we go, a fish eagle and it's the most beautiful call a bird ever makes.

So what other hobbies do you have apart from coaching football and Twitter?

I don't know if it's a hobbie, but I'm in love with literature and the written word. I'm never not reading three books at once, like my apartment is filled up with shoes and books just like stacked everywhere, it's ridiculous.

If you weren't a musician do you know what you would be?

I do, funnily enough. I know now but when I was studying at varsity I didn't. I would love to be a journalist you know. I picture myself with a bulletproof vest in a war zone crawling on my tummy under a tank and be reporting like: "Charles the weather is hot and the bullets are flying ... " that would be too cool I think.

Would you ever go all rock star on stage and smash your guitar?

Hell no! I'm too attached. I've got my acoustic guitar, her name is Diana and she's just my world like, if I had to smash her I would just die, it would just be awful.

"Crayon Boxes" is out now in stores and on iTunes.

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