{"id":56834,"date":"2018-10-03T14:50:07","date_gmt":"2018-10-03T18:50:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thatdope.com\/style\/miink-interview-on-small-clan-mixtape\/"},"modified":"2018-10-03T14:50:07","modified_gmt":"2018-10-03T18:50:07","slug":"miink-interview-on-small-clan-mixtape","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thatdope.com\/style\/miink-interview-on-small-clan-mixtape\/","title":{"rendered":"Miink Interview on ‘Small Clan’ Mixtape"},"content":{"rendered":"

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You\u2019ve seen Miink<\/a> before. The musician also moonlights as a model for some of the internet\u2019s favorite stores, appearing on the likes of Our Legacy<\/a> and Goodhood<\/a>. The West London-based artist has been doing this alongside simultaneously building a buzz, which kickstarted with \u201cWho Are You?\u201d a trippy single accompanied with a lo-fi video in an elevator.<\/p>\n

This single was followed by \u201cYellow Dust\u201d and \u201cScorched Moth,\u201d leaving Miink standing as a frequent fixture on BBC Radio, taking part in Benji B\u2019s<\/a> \u201cIn 3 Records\u201d series. And now Miink has created Small Clan<\/em>, which is described as a mixtape but, in this day and age of seven track albums, could easily be viewed and enjoyed as a full album.<\/p>\n

We meet Miink in Broadway market, East London in a traditional pie shop and ask him how he\u2019s dealing with the album being released \u2014 which it was earlier on that day. \u201c[I feel] a lot better to be honest,\u201d he says. \u201cFor a lot of days leading up to it, I was feeling horrible \u2014 it felt like there was a lot of things going wrong \u2014 just minor things but you get kind of trapped in the whole process, which is so long and so drawn out that you don\u2019t really see the woods to your work.\u201d<\/p>\n


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During this process, temptation came into play. \u201cA lot of friends that do unsavory things and they see the rewards weekly.\u201d The difference in lifestyles often led to doubts coming into play. \u201cThey can go and blow it cause they know they\u2019re going to make it back again the next week \u2014 during the build up, that stuff comes into your head a lot. You start thinking, \u2018forget it, I could just stop right now and just do that instead.\u2019 I could get that quick reward.\u201d<\/p>\n

But instead he stayed the course and instead of a quick reward, he\u2019s seeing a different, more sustained one. \u201cI felt the reaction from a lot of people, I felt their energy, it\u2019s a lot of support and it\u2019s a lot of support I didn\u2019t really know was there, it\u2019s like it\u2019s all just decided to come up.\u201d<\/p>\n

And the support he\u2019s received \u2014 as seen from positive write-ups from outlets as far-ranging as The Sunday Times to Clash magazine, has helped focus him for the future. \u201c[that reaction] is the reward. It energizes you, it makes you feel good and like you can go and do the same whole long process thing again.\u201d And this energy can now be worked into his live performances, something he\u2019s admittedly still working out.<\/p>\n

\u201cI get into it a lot because I\u2019m like \u2018T-Pain, one of the greatest.\u2019\u201d<\/q><\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t like live shows\u201d he says, having previously said in another interview that his music was \u201calone music.\u201d Instead he \u201cliked the alone thing, the isolation, I like having my own opinion of what\u2019s going on, not kind of getting moved by a whole bunch of people around me.\u201d His opinion towards live performances softened, noting the kind of raucous shows that typically become Instagram highlights.<\/p>\n

\u201cI started seeing a lot of these crazy shows. There\u2019s a lot of people crowd surfing and it looks really really fun. And I looked again and I\u2019m just like, actually, do you know what? It\u2019s just like a whole bunch of sweaty bros\u201d Sensing a disparity between these shows and the what he envisioned his own to be like, he has different plans. \u201cI might get some incense and have the place smell nice or something like that. My live show doesn\u2019t need to go down that exact route cause my music doesn\u2019t really suit that, it\u2019s a lot more intimate.\u201d One of the reasons why he wanted to release Small Clan<\/em> was so he could have more options for his live work. \u201cI think to start up it\u2019s nice to have a bigger body of work for live performances.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Another consideration behind the release was the increased pace of the music world now which, thanks to sites that constantly feed off content \u2014 like, admittedly, this one \u2014 artists worry about fading into the background. \u201cThere\u2019s just so much being put out there you can get overlooked too easily. So, it\u2019s a case of keeping up but not doing quantity over quality.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Miink, part of his plan is essentially building up his world \u2014 be it through his music and live performances or his visuals, which he says he often envisages before he\u2019s created a song. It\u2019s also bringing his varying influences \u2014 which range from early Kanye West to T-Pain \u2014 into one seamless place.<\/p>\n

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T-Pain is still in the midst of a career revival and is still among the names that people lazily assume was a bad artist because his sound eventually become impasse. It\u2019s a topic Miink still argues about \u2013 \u201cI get into it a lot because I\u2019m like \u2018T-Pain, one of the greatest.\u2019\u201d For him, enjoying T-Pain also connects to his Jamaican heritage. \u201cThat autotune in the music had been happening before T-Pain. I was used to it. Then T-Pain did it and I was just like, \u2018I\u2019ve got family in Florida, Jamaican family that moved up to Florida and I was like, that made sense to me \u2014 everyone\u2019s Jamaican or Haitian or Cuban there.\u201d<\/p>\n

One comment we\u2019d become accustomed to hearing about Small Clan<\/em> was that it\u2019s an album that upended expectations. While the bubbling success behind \u201cWho are you?\u201d could\u2019ve led an artist to attempt to recreate that magic, it\u2019s instead been something Miink has studiously avoided. \u201cI\u2019m never really gonna be [that kind of artist] because I\u2019m not gonna make the same song again.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe whole British music industry feels like it doesn\u2019t have a plan.\u201d<\/q><\/p>\n

Being pushed into trying to recreate similar songs is something that happens easily to newcomer artists, especially at a still tumultuous time in the industry. \u201cThe whole British music industry already feels like it doesn\u2019t have a plan. No one has a plan. Even the bigger artists don\u2019t see to have a plan. That just frustrates me endlessly.\u201d He goes onto say \u201cWhat are you doing if you\u2019re not making the music yourself, surely you\u2019re working on the other stuff? the plan, the other side of it, things like that? It just feels like no one\u2019s actually got that together. They\u2019re just throwing shit at the wall and seeing what sticks.\u201d<\/p>\n

If there\u2019s one thing that\u2019s clear, it\u2019s that Miink has a plan, but right now he\u2019s enjoying the reward of Small Clan<\/em>\u2019s release. \u201cPeople have been crying over this record already, so I\u2019m feeling good cause there\u2019s a space for it.\u201d And, in this increasingly crowded musical marketplace, a space within it is sometimes the best thing you can\u00a0have.<\/p>\n

Listen to Small Clan<\/em> below.<\/p>\n