Interview by: Cola Janneti
1.Introduce yourself to our marketplace.
Wassup ya’ll.. my name is Andrew Lloyd and I’m a producer/keyboardist/bassist born and raised in Hempstead, NY
2. How did you get into producing?
I had a friend who I played basketball with back in high school. One day he came by the house after practice and put FL Studio on my computer. Watching him make beats kind of inspired me to try it, and seeing him pull in money from selling them intrigued me even more. I’ve been playing piano since I was 7 years old, I’m 21 now so I’ve been dealing with music for pretty much my whole life, I figured I could make the transition into making beats and producing easily.
3. What kind of equipment do you use?
I use Propellerhead’s Reason 6 on my MacBook pro. Ive been using reason since I first started making beats so that’s really all I need. Basic midi keyboards, I got an mpc2500 that ive used from time to time. I also use FL Studio when working with my team.
4. You are signed to Young Fyre’s production team, Kasai LLC, how did get noticed by him?
A mutual friend told me that Young Fyre was looking for a keyboardist to play on some records. We linked up via IChat and I sent him some of the music I was working on at the time. After he heard it, he offered me an opportunity to be down with his company that he had. I had known Young Fyre’s name from when I first started making beats, so I jumped at the chance to be part of the team. Honestly Young Fyre is the best producer I’ve ever had the chance to work with. He constantly motivates me to get better at what I do, and we’ve made some amazing music together.
5. You have secured placements with Mac Miller, Young Jeezy and most recently on Lil Wayne’s The Carter IV, how did you secure those placements?
The Mac Miller situation is basically my boy Will Kalson had been working with Mac and had been telling me about him for a while. I sent Will some music for Mac to check out, and within the same day he sent me back the Face in the Crowd record which was on Mac’s KIDS mixtape. From then we just kept working and stayed connected, I think me and Mac have about 4 or 5 records together and hopefully many more to come. That’s my dude, and its good people over there at Most Dope.
The Jeezy record was actually a joint I did with my homie Djay Cas, we worked together on the record and he sent to DJ Folk who was getting Trap or Die II together at that time. That was my first record done with an artist who had a deal on a major label, especially one with such an extensive resume, it was a real good look.
The Carter IV placement just happened because me and Fyre are always working on something, He had most of the beat done and wanted me to add some instrumentation to it. I didn’t really think much of it until later; he told me T-Pain was going to use it so I was pretty excited at that. When I had went down to Atlanta and met up with Fyre that’s when he told me it had a good chance of being on the Carter IV and that’s pretty much how that went down.
5. Who would you like to work with in the near future?
Jamiroqaui, Deadmau5, Outkast, Flux Pavilion, The Neptunes, The Underdogs, Kanye West, Swedish House Mafia, Frank Ocean, Maroon 5, a range of different artists from different genres that I enjoy.
6. You have any advice for up and coming producers?
To always keep working, and try picking up an instrument. Really work on musicianship because it makes creating music 10x easier when you know your way around an instrument.
7. What can we expect next from Andrew Lloyd?
More placements with Young Fyre & The Kasai team, and a bunch of different projects with some artists that I think are really dope. I always got my hands in some sort of musical project, whether I’m producing, co-producing or playing keys/bass. So I’m gonna be everywhere by 2012.
