We’re living in the 13th year of High Focus Records. Their catalogue of UK releases now stands as one of the most influential and far-reaching in the British hip hop game. Fliptrix, (label founder and one-quarter of supergroup The Four Owls), now lives off-grid in Portugal while still manning his HF operations and raising a family. The MC’s new and ninth solo album Mantra No. 9 is finally out, its celebratory tour just closing in London. 

We managed to sit down with Fliptrix to find out where he and his music are at right now. Though he says he wants this project to be “timeless”.

Big Owl gives us an insight into how signings are made within the growing HF roster, in comparison to the past. Plus, he may have battled with the idea of bowing out after nine projects, but we learn who and what got him out of the creative slump and into a timeless future…

What spurred your move out to Portugal?

"In 2019 when the world kinda flipped on its head, after the first lockdown, I was thinking, 'This isn't going to be a quick thing'. So, I began looking for solutions to turn a negative into a positive and discovered Portugal. A friend of mine messaged me and said they were staying out there on some land. I spoke to my Mrs’ like, 'Would you be up for getting a motorhome and just going on an adventure?'. Twelve days later we left the UK. I packed up my studio, packed up everything and just hit the road. 

“We came to Portugal and fell in love with the country. It's got quite a small population and it's kinda like you're going back in time. It's at least twenty years back in time. There's hardly any cameras, there's hardly any people and you can't pay on card in loads of places. But what I really love about it is it's really abundant, so all the stuff that you need for life is here. There's water everywhere, everyone grows food, even if you go into the main cities, if anyone's got a tiny garden they're sure to have fruit trees in it. 

“We met a lot of friends and then decided that we wanted to get a place out here and now we’re fully off-grid. All my water comes from a well, all my electricity comes from solar panels, all my heating comes from fires and I've got over 100 fruit and nut trees. We grow a lot of food so we're getting close to being self-sustainable. That's the main vision, especially when you're looking at how messed up the world is now with the energy prices sending people bonkers. It doesn't affect us if the sun's shining [laughs].

“It's something I always wanted to do, but I figured I’d do it when I was fifty or sixty. What happened kickstarted that process earlier, but now I'm super happy because I'm raising my family out in nature. Instead of my son walking out onto concrete everywhere, he just opens the door and is running around in big fields, grass, streams and trees, making dens and all that fun stuff [laughs].”

How does life compare to what you envisioned?

"It's very different to what I thought though. It's raw. Living off-grid you've gotta put in the work, especially with things like fire season here. We just had one of the worst fire seasons in Portugal's living memory. I pretty much watched this mountain burn for twelve days straight. It's pretty mad and then it can be pretty rainy in the winter. You've gotta go cut the wood for the fire and really look after things. OK, so obviously everyone is under a 'government' and being 'governed', but by being governed there are the plus sides of being looked after by the state and making life easier, but if you remove yourself from that, you really have to look after yourself and your family. 

“It doesn't cost money in the same sense but it costs time and energy. But, it's just so rewarding and when it comes to food, the quality of food here is great. What I've really started getting into is eating locally and seasonally. Everyone around us is growing food; all of our food comes from a half-hour distance of where we live rather than being flown over from mad countries and packaged up for supermarket shelves. So yeah, it's been a journey."

Mantra No. 9 is your ninth album. How come it’s your “best yet”?

"For me, all my music is like a journey and a continuation. It's going to be really interesting even for me listening back, or when my son gets old enough to listen. In the first project I'm just finding myself and saying a load of things I would never say now. Then you come to Third Eye of the Storm, that's when I started going through more of an awakening and understanding a lot of stuff about the world, the universe, our connection to it and ourselves as human beings. Then with The Road to the Interdimensional Piff Highway I took that even further. In Polyhymnia I was really exploring death, what it is and where you go. 

“It's all just growing, but if you look in the Third Eye of the Storm album artwork on the inside, it goes from a picture of me in a city that's burning down with loads of guys all dressed in suits with CCTV cameras, then it moves along and by the end of it I'm in the sunshine on a beach walking off into the distance, and I feel like now I'm there. I envisioned it then, showing you where I was going to go. That's why it's Mantra No. 9, because nine is the highest numerical number before you start going back to ones and zeroes again. It's known as the God Number and there's a lot of deep, spiritual connotation behind the number nine. 
“With it being my ninth album, this is Mantra No. 9, this is getting me to the place that I always wanted to be. The reason why I decided that I wanted to make nine albums is when I heard Bob Marley blew up on his ninth album, (and I've been a massive fan of his), I was like, 'What a G. You made nine albums before you even got famous, that's epic'. That was the inspiration for me to get to this number and yeah man, it's been really special.”

There’s a mix of long-term associates and fresh names listed. What was your approach in tracking down collaborators?

"With my previous albums Light Work and Inexhale, I experimented more with the sounds and even more with some of the collaborators, like working with Jammz and Capo Lee from the grime scene. For me, my favourite music is boom bap hip hop - traditional sounding stuff. That's what I love and I think that's what my fans love the most. That’s why I wanted to make a classic rap record, and work with my long-time friends and collaborators from the High Focus family: Leaf Dog, Illinformed, Forest DLG, Mr Slipz, Pitch and a couple new guys. There's a guy on there called Elliott Revell who's so dope. No one really knows about him yet but he's been making beats for like 15 years, all sampling off vinyl, all on the MPC. I discovered him and was like, 'You're heavy', so we did a few tracks together. 

“In terms of features, we've got The Four Owls, Leaf Dog, Verb T, Coops, Ramson Badbonez, Onoe Caponoe, Jazz T and King Kashmere, so kept it kinda light but they're all some of my favourite UK MCs and my friends so it works out as well [laughs]."

On that, Kashmere and Verb T used to take you out on tour early on, but now you're close collaborators and their label boss. What's that change been like for you?

"Yeah man, it's been real fun. I was a fan of Verb T since I was young. He heard me at a couple open mics and was like, 'this kid can spit'. So I was like, 'If you rate what I do, do you wanna do a track?'. Paid for his bus fare and he comes down to the studio to do me a verse [laughs]. Then because Verb T and Kashmere were touring, they'd just bring me along, give me like 20 quid and I'd do a few tracks. I was gassed; it was classic. Then it all just grew and we made The Four Owls. 

“King Kashmere has always been one of my favourite rappers. I just love his voice, I love his off-the-wall esoteric references and his perspective on the world. I love working with them guys and it's great to see everyone growing and still blossoming this late into their careers. Those guys are hugely inspiring because of their output over so many years. Both of them are pretty much at the peak of their careers and they're as far into their careers as they can be."

You moved from looking up to idols at Low Life, to collaborating with them, then being revered yourself at HF and inspiring new generations. Does having an influence on others affect you creatively?

"If I can share my insights through my music for good, that will always inspire me. I know a lot of kids won't listen to their parents or their teachers but they'll listen to their favourite artists. Therefore, I'm in a position of power but also in a position of responsibility to put forward the right messages. I have the power to affect people's mindstate. If you're listening to something, it's affecting your mindstate, so the messaging is really important. That's why I try to promote self-belief, positivity, manifesting your own reality, and that love is the most powerful thing in the world. 

“I've had so many deep messages over the years, like: 'I didn't kill myself because of your songs or 'I got off smoking ice because of your music’, or people have asked me to sign T-shirts to put in their friends’ graves. Deep stuff. When I write, it's helping me but it's also helping other people, so I guess we're helping each other [laughs]."

There’s a great new breed of talent coming through. What do you look for in new signees and how does the linking process compare to early HF days?

"Obviously, the first two thirds of High Focus was completely, purely organic. Everyone just crossed paths and that's how it happened. The first sort of 'non-organic' one was Coops because I just discovered him. I was like, 'Rah you're dope, you're ridiculously good', and it fitted. He was doing straight up boom bap but he was putting his stuff on GRM Daily, Link Up TV, SB.TV - maybe not hitting his core audience because they’re not so traditional sounding. We linked up, got on really well, ended up making some music later. He put out a few albums on the label and we're really good friends. It was great for his career because it exposed his music to a load of people who were his core audience. 

“With TrueMendous it was mad. I was actually messaging her for years before she actually signed. Probably three years before she ended up signing. She was like, 'Ah nah, I'm just doing my own thing selling my CDs'. I was like, 'Cool, check in with you in a bit'. She did that for a bit longer then was like, 'Nah calm, let's go' [laughs]. A bit similar with Renelle 893. I was messaging Renelle for a few years before. I met him in Brighton but that time he was more starting off, getting his foot in the door. Then when he got a bit more serious, working with Kashmere and stuff, then he came on board. 

“All of it's still been quite organic, like meeting Renelle in person. Nelson Dialect happened through the Mr Slipz & Verbz link because they were already working together. But yeah, I just keep an eye out for someone who impresses me lyrically and I think it's really important to bring the new generation through. We're all getting older and I want to keep the spirit of hip hop alive in the younger generations, that’s my main aim. You've got to work with some of them so that they can in turn inspire that younger generation too. Yeah man, it's quite a full roster at the moment but I'm keeping my eye out. I'm happy though. We're in a good place."

You've just announced the High Focus 13th birthday party, where do you see the label by its 20th?

"I decided to dedicate my life to hip hop so no doubt it'll still be going [laughs]. I want to keep it going forever. But yeah man, hopefully more expansion, more growth. We've got a really good team at the moment. We're working on refreshing things a lot. We've got a new website coming, we've got a whole new wholesale thing coming, we've got an updated logo coming, we've got all the new signings. So yeah man, we're tightening all the screws to make sure all avenues are hit. 

“Guys like Griselda are an inspiration to me, how they're in the later stages of their rap careers but they're more popping than ever. They're taking it to new places so I just wanna keep getting bigger and expanding. And myself as an artist, for me, all this new music I've been putting out, I feel has been resonating a little more than maybe stuff that I did on my last couple albums. So, I feel even myself creatively, I'm getting to a bigger place than I have been before, which is encouraging. It's like, 'People are still into it so keep going'. The sky's the limit."

I heard you say you were tempted to call it quits after your ninth album, but you sound like you might have changed your mind. What would you do if you didn't continue...

"When I started, I always said I would make nine albums so that could be the end goal. But then I always wanted to make four Four Owls albums, and we've done three and are making the fourth. We're The Four Owls. We've gotta have four albums. So that makes thirteen. So that's like a minimum of what I want to achieve. But when I moved to Portugal, I was living in the van for a few months and I didn't have a studio. We didn’t perform for a couple years and when you do so many live shows, I likened it to being a football player who can never play a match. It's a bit wounding. But obviously everything's opened up now and we can perform again. 

“But if I didn't make music anymore I'd just turn into an off-grid mountain man in the distance. I'd turn into some myth that people are like, 'Where the hell is this guy?', 'I heard he's a myth living in the Portuguese mountains with hair down to the floor' [laughs]. But yeah, that still might happen, but I've got that creative buzz. It's hard to leave it. 

“Before I started making the ninth album I was a bit like, 'Ah I dunno if I wanna do it anymore', but then I did a feature for Verb T and it was really fun. Then, I wrote the track 'Eden' and really fell back in love with making music again. I'm in a beautiful place to create so I think I will always be creating. I would like more time with the family and more time on the land though! Less time on the phone and on the computer [laughs]."  

With the continued success of HF, when is the underground overground?

"Yeah that's a funny thing. We've had recognition from a lot of our heroes in the game, like working with DJ Premier and Masta Killa from Wu-Tang. I've ticked off pretty much all of my childhood dream collaborations. I worked with all of the OGs in the UK hip hop game and then ended up working with Premier, R.A The Rugged Man and artists from the very top of the tree. It's hard to define that. If we had had more mainstream support then maybe we could have got there, but who are the gatekeepers of the overground? And will they let us in? Or will they keep us under? I guess it comes to a level where you just peer over, like Griselda for example, brushing shoulders with Jay-Z, Nas, and being signed to Eminem's label. I guess you could say they've gone overground so it can happen. It's just harder and takes more determination. Maybe it'll take 20 years but we'll get there [laughs].”

What’s next for Fliptrix? And what goals are left to tick?

"My creative focus right now is Mantra No. 09, which is out now, so promoting that and touring that. Next up is finishing this new Four Owls album - that's the next big creative goal. Then I'm sure we'll do big tours for that, then keep grinding with the label and keep trying to take stuff to new levels. When I'm done, I want people to be like, 'That shit was legendary'. I want to achieve so much that it's almost going to be really, really difficult to top it [laughs]. Just because of the sheer output. I want to leave something special that will live forever. That's why I made a classic boom bap album, because I want it to be timeless.”