Lofi Girl, formerly known as ChilledCow, is a French music channel best known for its constant-running live streams that play lo-fi music promoted as being meant for studying, playing video games, or simply relaxing.
The channel's mascot is a character named Jade[1] (commonly referred to as the "Lofi Girl"), an anime-styled girl created by Juan Pablo Machado.[2][3] She has become a meme and is often parodied, cosplayed, and redrawn by fans.
History[]
The channel was created by Dimitri on March 18, 2015. The channel used a gif from the Studio Ghibli film Whisper of the Heart, resulting in its live stream getting taken down between July and October 2017. In March 2021, the channel rebranded from "ChilledCow" to "Lofi Girl". In April 2023, Lofi Girl launched a new livestream featuring an unnamed male character similar to Jade, commonly referred to as the "Lofi Boy".[4]
Music[]
Lofi Girl's channel focus is on lofi hip hop music but has also had jazzhop and chillhop featured.[5]
Lofi Girl has its own music label named "Lofi Records", releasing music from a variety of different artists to use in their streams, thus eliminating the threat of takedown due to copyright. On June 10, 2021, the channel announced through social media that all music released through the label would now be free to use for all content creators, provided that they gave appropriate credit. An example of a free-to-use song in this case is "Tender Spring x Blurred Figures x Middle School – Birds of a feather" or "Towerz x Spencer Hunt – Pillows", cause both of them are released under Lofi Records.
Lofi Hip Hop Radio[]
Lofi Hip Hop Radio is the name of Lofi Girl's two music streams, Beats to Study/Relax to and Beats to Sleep/Chill to. They both play a constant stream of music and are available 24/7. The girl in the live streams is called the "Study Girl".
In July 9-10 2022, the Lofi Girl stream was taken down by YouTube due to a copyright complaint. However, the stream was re-uploaded a couple days later on July 12, 2022.
Mixes[]
Lofi Girl also has several mixes, containing around two hours of music. These include the full tracklist for the 2018 and 2019 Lofi Hip Hop Radio streams, as well as a short mix featuring "sad" lofi tracks.
Partnerships[]
On June 20, 2022, Opera GX announced that for their birthday livestream they would be featuring original music and animation from Lofi Girl.[6]
Reception[]
Morgan Sung of Mashable, describing the nine lofi channels that she preferred, called Lofi Girl's lofi live stream "so universally beloved [that] it's become a meme."[7] Luke Winkie of Vice wrote that the anime figure used by Lofi Girl "set up the aesthetic framework for the rest of the people operating in the genre."[8]
Julia Alexander of The Verge said that channels like Lofi Girl "operate in a gray zone on YouTube", and risk receiving copyright takedown requests since they do not have ownership of all the songs they use.[9]
Trivia[]
- Jade is left-handed.
- She is based off of Shizuku Tsukishima from the Studio Ghibli movie Whisper of the Heart.[citation needed]
- Lofi Girl was listed as the inspiration for Will Smith's video "chill beats to quarantine to", which was uploaded March 20, 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic.[10]
Channel milestones[]
Note: The following dates are according to Social Blade. Dates may vary by one or two days due to differences in time zones.
Subscriber milestones[]
- 10 million subscribers: February 1, 2022
Video view milestones[]
- 500 million video views: July 2020
- 1 billion video views: November 6, 2021
Gallery[]
References[]
- ↑ "Pop Culture : la 'lofi girl' du live Youtube 'lofi hip hop radio' habite... à Lyon". 23 April 2020.
Translated from French: "The 'Chilled Cow' YouTube channel broadcasts a video loop of a young girl working with relaxing music in the background. Named Jade, she lives in Lyon!" - ↑ Study Girl. Know Your Meme (February, 2020). “Study Girl is an animated character created by Juan Pablo Machado for the YouTube channel Chilled Cow and their YouTube stream Lofi hip hop mix- Beats to Relax/Study to.”
- ↑ Machado, Juan Pablo. My Portfolio. jpmachado.
- ↑ Synthwave Launch 🌌 - Lofi Girl POV by Lofi Girl. YouTube. 12 Apr 2023.
- ↑ ChilledCow (2018). j'san. - I feel serene. YouTube. “hey guys, if you're an artist or know an artist who'd like to get their artwork featured as background for videos on the channel , please send an email to contact@thechillledcow.com , i'm actively looking for new wallpapers to use for my videos :)”
- ↑ https://twitter.com/operagxofficial/status/1538924478356496384/photo/1
- ↑ Sung, Morgan (May 4, 2020). 9 lo-fi beat YouTube channels to listen to while you try to work or relax.
- ↑ Winkie, Luke (July 13, 2018). How 'Lofi Hip Hop Radio to Relax/Study to' Became a YouTube Phenomenon.
- ↑ Alexander, Julia (February 24, 2020). YouTube briefly terminated a popular live stream channel, creating one of the longest videos ever.
- ↑ McCarter, Reid (March 26, 2020). Will Smith joins the lo-fi hip hop beats movement by sharing his own chill-out video. The A.V. Club. ““chill beats to quarantine to” replaces Study Girl with Study Smith and a cat whose back is turned away with a cat facing forward.”