Losing Today - Interview

  by John Clarkson

published: 13 / 1 / 2002

intro

First established in 1997, and beautifully packaged and presented with black and white or colour photographs on every page, Losing Today is a lavishly produced music magazine that specialises in what

First established in 1997, and beautifully packaged and presented with black and white or colour photographs on every page, Losing Today is a lavishly produced music magazine that specialises in what it describes as 'melancholic indie pop' and which concentrates primarily on the latest developments in the ethereal, shoegazing, gothic and dream-pop movements. While both its directors, editor Fabrizio Enea and publication director Edoardo Mollinari, are Italians, Losing Today is published in English. Each issue is named with an individual title. The first edition was entitled 'Lost in the Dark' and has been followed by 'The Sky is Grey' (1998), 'Painted Dream I' (1999) and this year's 'Painted Moon II'. Since 'The Sky is Grey', Losing Today have given away a unique compilation CD, running to at least fifteen tracks, with every issue. With it audience rising steadily in Europe and America, both Fabrizio Enea and Edoardo Mollinari spoke in an on-line interview with Pennyblackmusic about Losing Today's origins and its remarkable first three years ; the magazines and the CDs.. 1. Why is the magazine called ‘Losing Today'? FE : "Losing Today " is actually the title of a song from Slowdive. 7 years ago, my friend Edoardo with whom I founded LT, read an interview with Robert Smith of The Cure who mentioned some bands he used to like, of which I now remember just Ride and The Cranes. I think Slowdive was touring with The Cranes at the time. That is how he got into Slowdive. I remember when he bought the "Just for a Day" album. We were in his car and he played "Ballad of Sister Sue" and I was immediately crazy for the singer Rachel Goswell's voice. At the time, I felt very bad about how things were going in my life, and Slowdive was the perfect sound track... I used to spend hours in my room lying in bed listening to "Just for a Day" and another of their albums "Souvlaki" at the highest volume. Edoardo quickly started to spend all his money on CDs, and to form his culture in music. We decided to start a fanzine and I came up with the name Losing Today, which recalls many magazine titles that end with “today” and perfectly sums up everything that was behind the making of the magazine. PB : . Losing Today specialises in what it describes as ‘melancholic’ indie pop. What does Losing Today define as melancholic indie pop? EM: Losing Today was born as a Slowdive - shoegaze fanzine. We love introspective and melancholic music, from the incurable sadness of old artists like The Velvet Underground and Nick Drake, to the most recent post rock bands (Mogwai, Piano Magic and many others...), going through the dark side of New Wave, the noisy rock of The Jesus and Mary Chain, Twee pop, the Sarah Records style and the heavenly melodies of Cocteau Twins. Anyway, I think that it's not necessary to talk about a clear style of music, a rigid classification: we can just say that LT talks about music which explores one’s own heart and soul, music played for dreamers and romantic people. PB : The aim of Losing Today is to ‘introduce young bands on the verge of fame, as well as popular bands that have entered into the history of so-called indie music’. Can you tell us more about this? EM : There are a lot of great unknown bands around the world to listen to. We're proud to give an opportunity to those interesting artists to promote their music. It's a pleasure to discover young bands taking their first steps in the independent scene as well as to follow their evolution during the years. We're happy when some of the bands we reviewed or interviewed tell us they have been contacted by people who read about them in the magazine. We even had the chance to get in touch with some of the bands we've loved for a long time: it was amazing to interview great artists such as Mojave3, A.R. Kane, EOST, Lisa Gerrard, Simon Raymonde, Brendan Perry, Bowery Electric, etc). It was as if our most beautiful dreams came true. PB : The first edition of Losing Today was called ‘Lost in the Dark’. In which year did this come out? FM : It was 1997, and we decided to move to Offset printing, I had moved to Paris and I had an English friend of mine staying in my flat for a couple of months, and I took the chance to have all the articles written by Edoardo translated in English! PB : Since ‘Lost in the Dark’, there have been another three editions of Losing Today-’The Sky is Grey’ and ‘Painted Dream I’ and ‘Painted Dream II’. Why did Losing Today give the magazines these titles? Are these names taken `from somewhere, or did you just make them up ? FE : "Lost in the Dark" was taken from the Cure song "Pictures of You", when Robert Smith says "you were always so lost in the dark...", "The Sky is Grey" is from the song "Trust", "and now the sky is grey...", "Painted Dream" was invented by Edoardo and the CD covers are actually painted. These are perfect titles both for the argument and also for Edoardo’s writing style, which has also become a kind of style for Losing Today style and is is one of the main features that differs LT from other music magazines and gives it its own personality. PB : Farbrizio, have you been the editor of Losing Today since the beginning? FE : Yes! Actually I do everything apart from the contents which is done by Edoardo. We also now have a person for the advertising. PB : Did you have any previous experience of magazine publishing before you started Losing Today ? FE : Not at all. I made lots of mistakes at the beginning and maybe I'm still making mistakes... "Lost in the Dark" was actually a flop because of that, but fortunately there is always somebody who asks for it, and little by little, we are selling all the copies. Even though there isn't a CD, there are some of the best interviews we’ve done, some of which have been whit some of my preferred bands such as Mojave 3 and Chandeen. 8. While the Losing Today Head Office is in Rome, you live in Paris, Fabrizio. Why is this ? Is this because of work commitments? FE : Yes, I came here to Paris to improve my French, and then I had the chance to find a good job, but after one and ahlf years I resigned because I realized I didn’t like that kind of life. I’m tired of Paris now, I think I will move back to Rome for a while and then maybe go to the United Sates PB : From the start, each edition of LOSINGTODAY has been beautifully produced with a strong emphasis on artwork and photography. Darklost is the artistic director of Losing Today. Who is Darklost ? Is Darklost a professional artist? FE : LT looks like a professional magazine, the difference is inside. We are the biggest fans of the music we talk about, which is the soundtrack of our happy and less happy moments of life, that is the difference. I would define LT as a Fanzine “masked” in Magazine. Darklost is not an artist in the real meaning of the word. He is someone who needs to express himself and he is trying to do that in this way, doing the “maquillage” of the Fanzine. PB : Who else is involved in producing Losing Today? FE : With a new format and a now increasing circulation the costs are augmented. We also deal now with US national distributors who get the magazine at half the cover price. We need sponsors to help, and we now have someone who manages that. We also have some collaborators for the articles and the interviews. Edoardo can’t do everything alone as he used to do in the past. And there is an English translator for the articles written by people whose first language is not English. In total we have t a staff of abiout twenty people. PB : The magazine is Italian, yet it is written in English. Why did you decide to publish it in English ? FE : The reason we preferred English is just because we believed a magazine like LT would have more space in US. In Italy and in Europe distributors are generally quite reluctant to launch new products. It would have been impossible for us to grow here. PB : The magazine has both a European and an American edition. In what ways do the two differ? FE : There was a European edition only for “Painted Dream I”.The difference is actually that the US edition had a different logo and some mistakes inside had been corrected. The US edition was actually a reprint for a US distributors who ordered many copies, after having checked the so called European Edition. PB : Since ‘The Sky is Grey’, a compilation CD has been produced with each edition. The CD offers ‘readers the chance to discover the most promising young talent of the moment’. Can you say more about, these CDs and if there are any promising new bands out there, can they get in touch with you about appearing on future CDs? FE : The CD compilation is the core of LT. I could say that the magazine is built around the CD. Each compilation has it’s own theme. That is the reason we give the CD a title and not just a number as various magazines normally do. We collect the songs as if we are producing a CD which would be sold alone in a record store. I don’t want to mention a band in particular. The songs go through various sounds. I hear people being very enthusiastic for something others didn’t like at all, and vice versa. The CD from the beginning to the end, is a long trip which goes though different landscapes. Bands and labels can submit their music to our address in Rome, always including a brief description of the band, etc. PB : Will you continue to be releasing CDs with each subsequent edition? FE : Absolutely, as I said I consider the CD the core of the magazine. I would like to make a collection of the best of LT with a special issue of the magazine sooner or later. PB : Losing Today is now going to be publishing three new editions a year. What can we expect to find in it in the near future? FE : Interviews and reviews as always, but also more space for articles. Always combining simplicity with beautiful artwork. Simplicity is what our readers appreciate the most. Look for the next issue coming out in September! PB : Thank you