We were lucky to catch up with Bas Rev recently and have shared our conversation below.

Bas, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Can you tell us about a time that your work has been misunderstood? Why do you think it happened and did any interesting insights emerge from the experience?

Basrev is a DIY production team comprising three siblings (one brother and two sisters) and the support of our friends, family, and community. Since the beginning, we have prioritized remaining decentralized and keeping our identities private so that our work can speak for itself and people can relate to it more. However, in today’s era, people want to know who they’re supporting and that’s fine, so we have tried to show people who we were in the past but were not met with such enthusiasm. There is a misconception that our creative business is run by males only. When meeting people face to face, or via facetime, we have physically seen the confusion on their faces. Few people have even gone as far as to ask if certain ideas came from us, and act surprisingly shocked when we say yes. To make things worse, we have had multiple collaborations all of a sudden “Not work out” right after we they find out we are women. I don’t know where the miscommunication or misunderstanding stems from, but based on our past experiences, we like to keep our identities private. It is not all bad, we love and greatly appreciate the positive support we have received that surmounts any negativity. We have made long life friends in this community of creatives and we continue to do so through art, music, and compassion. We are grateful.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Basrev is a brand for everyone who loves authentic, honest, raw music, and art and is passionate about anything they love. Our organization hosts local music and art events all over Southern California. We also feature artist and band interviews on our youtube and social media. In 2019, we created a never been done before list, of local SoCal bands with links to their social media and music, it features over 700 local bands and we called it Basrev’s Socal Band Directory. Our last event was last year in San Diego, a new city for us, and we had a great time, we booked bands from the Inland Empire and some of them still get booked in San Diego. Our logo was hand drawn and created in 2017 and never changes; it is the only logo we’d like to be recognized by for years to come. Our merchandise shirts feature the logo, and it is the best feeling in the world to see our community wear our shirts and support us. Our job is to support our local artists, and we appreciate their support back. We would like to let our creative communities know, THANK YOU SO MUCH, for trusting us as a music and art resource in Southern California. We aren’t going anywhere anytime soon, we are only getting started.

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

Society has a huge role to play when it comes to supporting artists and creatives, and that is as simple as showing love. Support is given to a handful of people, and it can be discouraging. As a community we all need to support each other and give as many likes on social media as possible, it can be that small. People act as if giving a “like,” costs them nothing, it really is not that serious. A like on Instagram is all it takes for an artist or band to be noticed and it can open doors and opportunities. It is easier to support a celebrity than local talent I guess, but that’s not how it should be. Every famous artist or band started locally, with support from their hometown, bands like No Doubt, Sublime, and many more. Society can go to a local gig everyone and a while, follow local bands you like, and check out our directory to find them all, and don’t forget to like and share! Thank you Society!

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

When we first started our social media, back in Feb 2017, we had a strategy, be honest and stay local. We wanted to only follow local people who were involved in music and art, we also wanted to actually get to know our community. Our page consisted of good old conspiracy theories, mixed with art and honest captions, I think we got our local youth’s attention. We also were the first to book bands from different cities in one show versus the same city same band lineups we used to see. The mix-and-match approach worked and we wanted to push it further by always booking a new band no one had heard of and helping them get booked. Shoutout to the bands who have said we booked their first show and now are selling out venues. Our “audience” is just like a family we have met and stayed connected with over the years, a bunch of smart, talented, and creative human beings.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://basicallyrev.wixsite.com/2020/socal-band-directory
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bas_rev/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@basicallyrevolutionary

Image Credits
Photographer: Robert Nunez / IG: @ttepz