No Tags is a podcast and newsletter from Chal Ravens and Tom Lea, chronicling underground music culture.
Who are we?
Based in London, Chal and Tom are club music lifers who like to think they’ve been fighting dance music’s good fight since the late 2000s.
Since meeting through mutuals in the heyday of Kingsland Road clubbing, we worked together editing FACTmag.com in the early-to-mid 2010s, building one of the web’s best outposts for cutting-edge club music and beyond.
Post-FACT, Chal became one of the most acclaimed freelancers on the circuit, her bylines a fixture in The Wire, The Guardian, Pitchfork and Dazed, and is currently head of audio at Novara Media, creating lefty podcasts about politics, history and culture. Tom, meanwhile, created an award-winning independent record label in Local Action, and has managed and worked with countless key artists in the fields of dance music, R&B, grime and more.
Why No Tags?
In short, we got sick of moaning about the lack of coverage and quality interviews with some of the figures that we think are doing God’s work in this niche music sphere we inhabit, and decided to Be The Change instead. The name is a tribute to the Blogspot and mp3-sharing era that essentially birthed the pair of us – R.I.P. Dat Piff.
So… what is it?
No Tags is a podcast where we talk to the artists and industry figures we think deserve more recognition, and get into the weeds about the latest developments in underground music. Interview-based episodes come accompanied with an edited, written version of the interview, sent out via our newsletter here on Substack.
How does the paid tier work?
Look, the main reason we’re doing this is to chronicle culture in the way we believe it warrants. The podcast is always going to remain free, and our priority is people listening rather than paying.
However, if you do want to support what we’re doing, the paid tier of No Tags on Substack costs £5 a month. Recording and editing a weekly podcast takes up a lot of our time and it’s our paid tier whose support allows us to continue doing what we’re doing, so we really do appreciate it.
If you upgrade to our paid tier, we’ll also send you a discount code for our book No Tags: conversations on underground music culture.
We don’t have any sponsors or backers and are funding No Tags ourselves, so any money we make from our paid tier goes straight back into the show.
Where can I listen?
Everything will live right here on Substack – however, you can listen to main episodes at the usual podcast apps (Apple Podcast, Spotify, Overcast etc). You can follow us on Instagram.
Anything else I need to know?
No Tags is a work in progress. We currently release an episode every two weeks, and generally alternate between guest episodes and Tom and Chal ones, but that could always change in the future.
It’s a journey: strap in and enjoy the ride!
Credits
Branding: All Purpose
Theme music: Jennifer Walton
