HEBE X ICS

We met ICS back in October 2010. Team Hebe attended a Harvey Nichols event and saw the boys perform for the first time alongside a catwalk. We loved their sound which was, and still is, difficult to pin down, so we introduced ourselves to the band and so began the Hebe/ICS love affair.

In May 2011 we produced Leeds In Barcelona: A Creative Encounter which took Leeds creative talent over to Barcelona for a special showcase event. This was the perfect opportunity to collaborate with ICS for the first time, which was what we had been wanting to do since we met them. It gave ICS a great opportunity to perform to a European audience of opinion-formers and we knew they were the perfect band to take as they are ‘fresh, innovative and heavily influenced by the underground of the city and the fashion scene (Lee, Hebe May 2011)’.

Josh performing in Barcelona

After the Creative Encounter

The Barcelona Creative Encounter was great for many reasons but one of the most important was the relationships that were formed on the trip. When you have fashion designers, DJs, bands and media specialists hanging together for three days you are constantly talking creative collaborations and getting to know more about what each other is about. 

On the trip we introduced ICS to our friends at Back to Basics: Dave Beer and Tristan Da Cunha. The guys got on like a house on fire and we were soon talking of what we could do when we got back to Leeds.

We all already knew in the back of our minds that we needed to work together in an official capacity, but obviously first we had to drink lots of beer, watch documentaries about The Clash and party together before any deal was agreed!

After this hard work was done, so was the deal and now ICS are officially managed by Team Hebe and Dave Beer! The boys performed at the Back to Basics 20th anniversary bash with Bez and Pritch which was fun and are scheduled to play Live at Leeds on May 5th. Keep checking the ICS website and Facebook page for updates about upcoming gigs and track releases. In the meantime check out a track from the new EP, Cassette Tapes below...

 ICS do a one-time acoustic set at Lee's birthday party

The Hebe Week In Pics

Work Hard: Lee and I talking Leeds Online at LDF Write-Publish-Read Play Hard: Disney On Ice Work Hard: Shang Ting talking Uk Observing Play Hard: Hell yeah!Music: This guy got a lot of attention over on LOL! Leeds Online. We think he's ace!Drink:Wittards Hot Chocolate, Cath Kidston huge mugs!Food: Lovely Sandwiches from Out Of The WoodsDom's masterpiece featuring all of the Leeds In Barcelona team!

Adam Tensta - The Monkey (with Spoek Mathambo)

Our next Creative Encounter with Stockholm is coming soon and we want to keep you up to date with what some of the main players are up to. Check out this new video from Adam Tensta and get ready!

The Hebe Hit List: Corey Latif Williams

Photo: Julian Essink Fotografie

In this new series of posts, we are featuring the people we are going to try and work with in the next year. We made a 'hit list' list last year, but kept it secret inside Hebe. We managed to tick off a lot of people on the 'Year 1 List' such as Hyper Island, Heineken, LeLook and IED Barcelona. Now we focus on the 'Year 2 List' and first up is one of our favourite RnB artists: Corey Latif Williams. 

I first started checking out 'Latif's' stuff in 2006, most noteably the tracks Who's Lovin Her Now and the brilliant U Think U Know. I could tell immediately Latif was something special and after further digging I discovered he had non-other then the absolute legend that is Teddy Pendergrass as a mentor. Around this time (2006-2007) I was really into Latif, Johnta Austin (thanks to Turn It Up) and Ryan Leslie (thanks to Used 2 Be) . These guys were bringing something fresh at that time and regular collaborations between them usually resulted in some quality stuff. (I will try to dig out some of my live mixes from this time and post)

Since then the Grammy Award Nominated Latif has been in the studio working on new material and also getting his writing on for a number of other artists such as Chris Brown, The Roots and Musiq Soulchild. He has also put out a number of tracks online such as I Love U, Promise Me and No Mystery. 

U Think U Know feat. Ryan Leslie by Corey Latif 

Hebe x Latif 

In our past few music events we have featured stuff from house music legends like the Back to Basics gang and up and coming Punk / Dub band ICS. We definitely want to do something with RnB in the coming months and Latif fits the bill perfectly: He is young, mega-talented and we can see some amazing potential for collaboration with some of our peeps here in the UK. Remixes, live-performances, creative collaborations with fashion designers and artists, the possabilities are endless.

We are planning Creative Encounters with cities in America next year and we will definitely be exploring the possibility of hooking up with Latif and getting him involved. After all he did provide the soundtrack for some of the music and fashion projects that eventually led to the creation of Hebe Media so it would be amazing for us to make that contact five years after we were introduced to Latif and get him involved with some of our projects.

Watch this space over the coming months and hopefully we will report back good news! In the meantime check out his new track below :)

Look back at August

August was a bit of a crazy month here at Hebe! Watching and making films, partying / drowning at festivals, kick-ass presentations, cool events, photo-shoots, funny interviews, intriguing meetings, Stockholm, Manchester, London and much more. 

We have been working behind the scenes on a number of new projects including Creative Encounters in Stockholm, Taipei and Hangzhou. We have also agreed two new partnerships which we will be annoucing officially in the next week or so.

LOL! Leeds Online has made great strides in the past month and the Facebook Page alone is about to pass 47,000 members. We are also developing ideas for further platforms and content for the project which should start to go live during September.

UK Observing Diary is still kicking ass and attracting millions of views every month. The girls are in the final stages of writing their eagerly awaited first book. Clair is now blogging for Vogue Taiwan so big congratulations to her on that! Shang Ting is leading our charge in Asia and we are putting peices in place for some amazing Hebe events and experiences over there including a Taipei x London x Leeds Creative Encounter!

Looking back at the blog during August, we have been mainly taking pictures! Shang Ting's Street Style, Stacey's Week in Pics and an update and new gallery from Simon on his residency at Whitechapel Gallery in London. We also posted some of the (publishable) pictures from our Barca Crew Reunion including partying with Howard Marks and Louise Rennison. 

We are launching a couple of new features on the blog during September that we are pretty excited about. Plus after around 18 months of trying to figure out our 'about' page, we think we have finally figured it out (but dont hold us to it!)

Peace out for now!