Even if you are doing something you are passionate about and skilled at for a living, there may come a time when you begin questioning if you are truly satisfied with the status quo. Sometimes, that discontentment can be the spark for a new creation, as seen in the origin story of SAVOIR-FAIRE!.
The media platform and agency, which was launched back in January of this year, is the brainchild of multi-disciplinary creative Ian Lim — who has photographed music icons such as Red Hot Chili Peppers, Gwen Stefani, and Slash and marketed shows by artists such as Thundercat and ASAP Ferg —and Achille, an international creative whose list of collaborators includes Jaden Smith, Toro y Moi, and Hideo Kojima.
After spending eight years in the music industry as a freelance photographer and videographer, Lim, who regards music as one of his greatest loves, began feeling "extremely jaded".
"It was like, 'Ok, I’ve shot another famous artist that I like, now what?' I was living my day-to-day uninspired, on autopilot. I realised that I needed a new direction in life – I had accomplished some great things already, and was bored of being known for just my camerawork because there’s a lot of other things that I do to a high standard," he recounted.
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Achille, Lim's close friend of seven years, shared Lim's sentiments and also had a desire to fill the gaps in the industry he had observed. With their minds aligned, the two planted the seeds of their new venture in 2022 and watered it on the quiet for two years.
The venture would later be known to the public as SAVOIR-FAIRE!. Defined by dictionaries as the ability or capacity to say what is right and behave appropriately in social situations, the name tells you all you need to know about Lim and Achille's approach towards unearthing new stories.
Lim explained: "We weren’t content with the content (haha) getting put out on the Internet and knew that we could bring something actually new to the market, with a heavy focus on authentic, intimate storytelling and visuals, backed by fervour and actual knowledge of and for music and culture – which we truthfully felt was missing."
To date, Lim and Achille have, through SAVOIR-FAIRE!, brought music lovers even closer to their favourite artists through the intimate pH-1 documentary, DR. HARRY AND MR. BAD, and collaborations with Thai singer-songwriter Phum Viphurit, South Korean hip-hop act KOALA, and Australian singer-songwriter grentperez.
In an interview with Bandwagon, Lim and Achille spoke about their "raw" style of storytelling, the key to building relationships with the artists they work with, and how they brought DR. HARRY AND MR. BAD to life.
Tell us a bit more about the work you do over at SAVOIR-FAIRE! and how it fits into the music ecosystem.
IAN: Most people know Achille and me for our camerawork, and while that’ll remain an integral part of what we do at SAVOIR-FAIRE!, we’re not too keen on categorising the company. A general label would be a media platform and agency. We’re proud to have been able to serve the ecosystem in a few ways we haven’t publicly spoken about yet.
For example, when we toured with pH-1, he and his record label H1GHR MUSIC (shout out to the homie Jae) wanted to show love and add some local flavour in the form of bringing on surprise artists. They asked if we could leverage our connections to help with securing suitable, native special guests in Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, and Bangkok. We ran through our network and strategically thought about who would bring genuine star power and surprise to each city. Long story short, we managed and finalized the booking of ShiGGa Shay, SonaOne, and AUTTA, respectively, within days.
We also invited Def Jam SEA Managing Director and legendary Malaysian artist Joe Flizzow to the KL show, and he very generously hosted everyone that day.
Similarly, we’ve toured with UK musician Kamaal Williams, and received a request to produce a show for him to make his long-awaited DJ debut under his alias Henry Wu in Singapore, which is where we’re based. He wanted to spin right after his live show with his band on the same night, so to complete the lineup, we booked Dean Chew from Darker Than Wax to open for him. That Henry Wu show became our debut event — we made the show happen from request to showtime in less than 20 hours. Shoutout and thanks to Andrew & Represent for getting us involved on the tour in the first place, Clement & Thugshop who was our venue partner and provided logistical support, plus Zaran & Collective Minds who brought in the Kamaal Williams live show.
We’re glad to have been entrusted with making some other really cool things happen behind-the-scenes, but those are stories for another time!
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ACHILLE: We’re committed to staying genuine and being truthful to our vision, as well as that of our artists. Our style is to keep things raw, and since our reputation and quality of work has allowed us to consistently acquire rare, end-to-end access with musicians and artists, it allows us to document celebrity figures in private, intimate settings — portraying them beyond their public facades.
Steering clear of overtly corporate and commercial tripes is also a defining trait of our work. It’s definitely essential that we consistently stay honest to ourselves and have a real love and passion for music and culture.
It’s definitely essential that we consistently stay honest to ourselves and have a real love and passion for music and culture.
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Since SAVOIR-FAIRE!’s inception, you have worked with grentperez, Phum Viphurit, KOALA, MILLI, and pH-1. What drew you to these artists? What are some things that you look out for when deciding who to collaborate with?
IAN: We’re drawn to artists that are uncompromisingly true to themselves, and make art that we genuinely enjoy. That’s how we sift through the sheer amount of artists in the world and cut through the noise.
Achille and I don’t make music, but we’re connected to the musicians we work with through the notion and shared values of being artists. That allows us to see ourselves in them, though we create via different mediums.
SAVOIR-FAIRE! doesn’t create work that we don’t genuinely resonate with, so we look out for that same principle in artists. Coupling that with ensuring that we enjoy their art helps with curation and direction, and adds a unique, reflective touch of our humanity and personality to the brand — we’ve found it to be important to make sure we’re not too overly corporate and commercial, as well as a constant reminder of why we’re doing this.
SAVOIR-FAIRE! doesn’t create work that we don’t genuinely resonate with, so we look out for that same principle in artists.
ACHILLE: Yeah, we’re blessed to have the luxury to work with artists that we actually personally listen to and enjoy. It’s an easy way to make sure we don’t compromise ourselves and stay true to our own vision and goals.
For example, I’d been bumping pH-1 for years before we even met. I had discovered him through Spotify’s algorithms and suggestions after listening to a lot of Jay Park back in the day, and pH-1 has been on constant rotation since then.
It doesn’t get better and more natural than working closely with artists that we’ve been actually supporters of.
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Let’s zoom in on DR. HARRY AND MR. BAD, the pH-1 documentary short that you launched in January. How did you approach this film? What’s different about it as compared to other documentaries on musicians?
IAN: Working on this pH-1 documentary and tour, we were blessed to build friendships with one of his managers, Jae, and another artist, KOALA, who have both helped us out a lot in general. Like pH-1, they’re all Korean-American, and schooled us on the intricacies and nuances of merging both cultures — especially the concept of “Nunchi (눈치)”. They shared personal stories about how it applied to them growing up as third-culture kids, and even now as adults in the professional world. It gave us an authentic insight into Korean culture, and influenced the direction we took with DR. HARRY AND MR. BAD as we explored the narratives of pH-1’s struggles with identity, fame, and filial piety.
ACHILLE: We explored the concept of duality pretty heavily on this one. We noticed that it’s a quality quite prevalent in pH-1’s artistry — from how he balances dark lyrics over uplifting productions, to his ability to use a good mix of coloured and monochromatic visuals, and the way he balances his explosive energy on stage, to his more laidback vibe off the stage.
Duality is a consistent theme, so we decided to use it as an anchor for the storyline.
The reception to the documentary has been very positive, with some fans calling the way it tells pH-1’s story “authentic” and “beautiful”. How encouraging is it for you to see the fans of an artist appreciating and connecting with your work?
IAN: We’re extremely appreciative of the overwhelming positive reception, and it’s very encouraging to watch the fans engage with our art.
Fans can be very critical of how their favourite artists are portrayed and represented. We’re really thankful for the outpouring of love offline and online, especially in the form of hundreds of Instagram DMs and YouTube comments from both industry mates and diehard fans.
ACIHLLE: It’s definitely really encouraging. Reading the hundreds of comments and DMs that we received touched us deeply. This is why we do what we do.
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When telling the story of a musician, be it through photographs or a film, what is most important to you?
IAN: Genuineness. We absolutely love what we do, but the scene is often over-glamorized. We’ll always maintain an element of rawness in our creations just to strike that balance and take things off the edge a little. You’ll often see rarely-portrayed, different sides of these artists in our work — whether in how they’re captured, how they behave, or just the settings they’re in.
With that being said, “comfort” is very important too. The different sides of these artists that we get to capture takes a lot of experience to coax. Most of them have been extensively media-trained and taught what to say or act for media outlets, but because of our personal experience with managing artists, celebrities, and reading the room, they often find themselves letting their guard down around us, as if we were friends (which has also lead to a lot of genuine friendships) – allowing connection on a deeper level. Sometimes we have to push artists out of their comfort zone, but it’s always about striking that balance and savoir-faire — which is one of the reasons and meanings of the actual phrase we named the company after.
There are a couple of experiences early on that led, and greatly encouraged me on this path. I’ll just talk about one instance today which sums up the two values mentioned above. This was with bass legend Pino Palladino. He’s played with everyone from D’Angelo and Erykah Badu, to Ed Sheeran and Adele. He was in town with John Mayer, so I personally hosted and showed him around. We ate, drank, shopped plenty, and I photographed everything. Before I sent him back to his hotel, I thanked him for allowing me to document him, and his response was something along the lines of: “Yeah... You know, I don’t do this shit often. I’m usually very private. But today was very nice, and it felt right. Thank you for everything. I’ll tell my kids to hit you up when they’re in town — I want them to experience what I did!”
He then very generously gifted me a pair of VIP tickets to the sold-out John Mayer show (we were seated behind David Foster), and arranged for security to escort us backstage to hang out.
As a documenter of culture, those are some of the best compliments you will ever receive.
The different sides of these artists that we get to capture takes a lot of experience to coax.
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ACHILLE: The most important thing to us is to stay true to the situations we’re in. Things don’t go exactly the way we’ve planned them pretty often, so there’s always a fair bit of improvisation involved.
We make things work no matter what happens, and play with the cards that we are dealt in situations where we just have to keep things moving and fluid. We don’t shy away from things.
We make things work no matter what happens, and play with the cards that we are dealt in situations where we just have to keep things moving and fluid.
What are your plans for SAVOIR-FAIRE! going forward? Beyond documentaries and artist photography, are there any other kinds of content that you would like to explore?
IAN: I can’t share too much at this time, but authenticity and purpose is always going to be the core of everything we do. It’s about to get really exciting.
ACHILLE: I want to work with Kanye West before he dies.
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