For those unfamiliar with the genre "easy listening" here's a link to a Wikipedia article about it
this post was submitted on 15 Nov 2023
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Basically trip hop for people who missed out on or are too young for trip hop.
Nujabes, Massive Attack, Portishead, Unkle, Little Dragon, and many more great artists/bands that all have produced albums and songs that could be described as lofi, often find their work in lofi mixes.
"Lofi" as it is understood nowadays is more about background music that aims not to be distracting when working/studying. Basically lofi == "lofi (to study to)".
Trip-hop like Portishead does it, while it is "low fidelity" (as in it uses warm tones, crackling, record scratching, etc), it is not lofi, in the same way that Sabaton is Rock but not Rock&Roll.
Wow, I never thought I was so old as to be out of touch. To me, “lo-fi” without the “lo-fi hip hop” specification is really, like, rock/indie rock, but literally with lo-fidelity recording. It’s like a punk practice that was put into use for rock or indie rock, sometime in the early-to-late 2000s.
Think early white stripes, the growlers (their first album or so anyway), king khan & the BBQ show, maybe The Babies could fit into this category.
But “lofi beats”/“lofi hip hop” is a separate designation. But it needs the “hip hop” modifier because “lo-fi” existed before the YouTube playlist of simple, relaxing beats to study to thing.
So, I guess what I’m saying is, “these damn kids don’t know what lofi even is anymore. With their YouTubes and their handheld nintendos—dress them up all you want! I know a game boy when I see one!”
I'm a young millennial and I'm with you.
I imagine doing homework undistracted while Unkle's Warstories or Portishead's Dummy are playing. Or how DJ Shadow would fit on the same shelf as this one tired anime girl with her studying hip-hop beats. It's a bit of a stretch to put them together, if not for a dozen of neutral songs in their discographies.
I used to study to DJ Shadow all the time.
It's basically the same genre, but "Trip Hop Beats to Relax/Study To" just doesn't have the same ring to it