To everyone that wants a soundtrack to their lives just like all their favorite TV characters have, you’re in luck. Lo-fi music streams are drawing millions of listeners on YouTube. If you want, you can tune in and let the subtle, complex and soothing rhythms set the tempo for whatever you’re doing.
“Lo-fi” means “low-fidelity,” a term for music where you can hear imperfections that would typically be considered errors in the recording process. On YouTube channels like ChillHop music or DreamyCow, however, those “mistakes” become an intentional part of the listening experience. Listeners from around the world let the livestream play for hours on end, and the channels have boomed in popularity during the pandemic.
Those connecting to lo-fi hip hop for the first time, whatever the format, instantly feel some sense of community. That’s how Toni Blackman, a musician, artist, teacher and the first hip-hop ambassador to the U.S. State Department, felt back when she first heard it decades ago. “I felt like I had found home,” she says, remembering asking herself, “[if] there are other artists thinking like me, feeling how I feel?”
