Powfu is remarkably laid back for a man who has been riding high in the Top 10 of the UK singles chart for months, but that is very much his thing. Supremely assured, marching to the beat of his own drum and pursuing his own lo-fi vision, Powfu is ready to take his chilled out vibes global.
Even if you might not have realised you'll definitely have heard Powfu's music at some point in the last year. Whether it's on the smash hit Beabadoobee featuring viral banger 'Death Bed', or in the wildly creative online ether of Youtube or TikTok, his very modern hybrid sound has been everywhere. As he speaks to us from his lockdown bedroom retreat in his native Canada, "hanging out with my girlfriend and just playing video games," Powfu is taking his rise very much in his stride. "I want to have another song blow up like 'Death Bed' did, but I don't feel any pressure," says the man born Isaiah Faber. "I'm not nervous about it. I'm just chilling and making music like I always do."
The way he's always been making music was born from an early introduction. "My dad was in a punk rock band called Faber Drive," he explains. "So, when I was 2 years old, he taught me to play the drums, and I would practice every day for half an hour. That was my introduction. When I was 11, I got sick of the drums, and I started playing guitar more. About 16 or 17, I started making my own music on the computer. I would just write stupid songs. They were mostly garbage, but I kept working on it and started releasing stuff on SoundCloud, and it went from there."
Powfu has come up in a time when it's never been easier for all manner of different artists to find an audience and use different platforms to forge a community. In this case, Youtube and Soundcloud have allowed Powfu to experiment and hone his craft and his sound while growing a hugely loyal audience. The music that he makes fits the homegrown nature of this operation. "I make lo-fi hip hop with a punkish element," he says. "I'm mixing punk music with hip-hop. Lately, I've been listening to a lot of punk rock - Simple Plan, Yellowcard, Blink 182. Those are my two favourite genres. I'm blessed to be able to do that. I just try and do whatever sounds good. I just think if I were to listen to this, I would hope other people would listen to it."
