Playlizt: a platform for Peruvian music that is projected big

The project started 10 years ago and since then it has received more than 100 bands or artists. It’s called Playlizt and surely you’ve come across some of its videos on Youtube, in which he presents musical proposals in live sessions, but with careful visual treatment as well. An ideal platform for our musicians to be heard (and seen) by many more people.

“When the project started, in 2012, we were at a different juncture. There was no Spotify, YouTube was still small, and for the bands it was very difficult to record an album”, explains Daniel Higashionna, director of the production company Señor Z, which runs Playlizt. “And what we gave bands was an opportunity to not only visualize themselves with people, but with promoters and festivals. Many were able to go on tour from this. It was a very cool experience,” he adds.

Bands and figures today recognized as Tourista, Laguna Pai, Mundaka, Turbopótamos, Millions of colors, Lorena Blume, Chintatá, Barrio Calavera, Bareto, Gala Brie, Olaya Sound System and more. “In a way it’s about showing people the music out there,” adds Higashionna. That’s why we try not to put anyone very famous, because the idea is rather to look for artists who are emerging.

And that spirit of impulse and promotion is what they seek to reinforce today, even with a view to something much bigger. “In the long term, we plan to relaunch the Playlizt website and turn the platform into a comprehensive support medium from the music industry –explains Horacio Palomino, producer in charge of the project–. Not only to the musicians, but also to all the actors that are involved in the music industry: management agencies, booking, etc.”

Just a few weeks ago, Playlizt launched a new season after two years of silence due to the pandemic. It is an interesting session with the band We The Lionwhich this time has had the participation of guest artists such as Nicole Favre, Marshall, Strike and the Mexican singer Melissa Robles.

“The dynamics of this new season will be a bit like that,” Higashionna points out. Start having ‘featurings’ (collaborations) with artists who are of different genres, so that people get to know them. If you are a fan of We The Lion, you will be able to meet the other artists. Or vice versa”.

The session with We The Lion was recorded in the locations of the Dadá restaurant and bar, in Barranco, as part of an initiative to recover some places that were paralyzed due to the pandemic. The idea of ​​the production of Playlizt is to be able to make alliances with other spaces in order to bring music to them, also as a symbol of the recovery of local musical and artistic activity.

What other bands can we see in this season of Playlizt? Although its producers still cannot let go of what is to come, they anticipate that it is “a nice challenge” to have to choose between so many possibilities. “Something good about the pandemic is that it woke up many musicians who were hidden,” says Palomino. There are many more projects than beforethen it is a challenge to see, within everything that exists, how to be able to record all of them without letting any of them escape us”.

Higashionna, for his part, throws up some names like the ‘freestyler’ Jaze or the singer-songwriter Carlos Cruzalegui, reflecting a more eclectic trend in musical genres. “If you see the platform, maybe you could say that it is more focused on pop rock; but in truth it is almost a historical coincidence, because they were the bands that were playing at that time –he warns–. Today there is an important interest in diversifying, not pigeonholing ourselves into a single genre, and also in decentralizing ourselves”.

For this reason, Playlizt’s schedule for this year is planned with quarterly sessions (such as We The Lion), but also launching in the interim some special programs that bring together three artists of different styles in a single session. An excellent opportunity to continue discovering and supporting the new talents of our music.