Toro y Moi on his latest album ‘Hole Erth’
Creating new music that is more amplified with an angstier lens. How the collaboration with Duckwrth & Elijah Kessler came about for “Reseda". His highlights working on the album. Biggest lessons he has learnt across his career. Tour & more.
Fuzzer: Well let’s dive straight into it - “Hole Erth”! What an amazing album! Obviously you’re known as the genre shapeshifter and there’s lots of influences here in the alt space, rap-rock, anthemic punk pop, melancholic rap that really evokes that feeling of nostalgia. Can you explain a little bit about the concept of “Hole Erth” and what it means to you?
Toro y Moi: Yeah, I think I kind of just wanted to make something that was a little bit more amplified and kind of had an angstier sort of lens. Felt like it was something I wanted to get out of my system sooner than later.
Fuzzer: Yeah! And something we do for each of our interviews is customise a cocktail recipe in relation to the project we're talking about. So if “Hole Erth” was a cocktail, what kind of flavors would it have? What kind of liquor do you think it would have?
Toro y Moi: Probably be a whiskey.
Fuzzer: Oh yeah nice!
Toro y Moi: It's a dark Americana (laughs). American Gothic is what a friend said. Yeah, I don't know. Maybe an Old Fashioned with maybe something thrown in extra.
Fuzzer: Nice, okay cool! We'll come up with something when we share the interview. So one of our absolute favourite tracks on this album is “Tuesday”. Can you talk us through a little bit about the production and writing process behind that one?
Toro y Moi: Thanks! Yeah, “Tuesday” was I think, maybe the second tracks I wrote other than the Don Toliver stuff - that being something I just wrote truly just for Toro. And that one was like a challenge, because I had to sort of work with this new pop punk sound, just sort of figuring out like what the sound is, where is it going.
Fuzzer: And then “Reseda” is another one of our favourites. How did that collaboration come about with Duckwrth and Elijah Kessler?
Toro y Moi: Thanks. Yeah I mean, Duck and I have known each other for some time now, and same for Elijah. I think both I met around 2016 and we just always wanted to do something together. But I think basically the song came together when I was in LA for sessions, and this record for me was all about sort of playing more the producer role and taking a step back from the microphone and trying to really help just coach a song. Not even coach an artist, but coach a song and just like help a song live and find itself between two different songwriters. How can these two different perspectives sort of be morphed into something - possibly through a hook, you know? So it's like that kind of thing.
But yeah, I was in LA for the sole purpose of trying to find vocalists, and one of the people that responded was Duck. Duck sent through his verse in first, and then that sort of informed where I should sort of go or try to stay with it, and then from there, I added Elijah, kind of like last minute. Elijah was in town for his own record, so yeah.
Fuzzer: Yeah, it sounds amazing! And both those artists are so incredible. What do you think were your main highlights working across this entire album? Were the any core memories or moments that you had?
Toro y Moi: For sure. It was the first time I really took the record off of my own computer and put it into Pro Tools and a hard drive and just bopped around studio to studio. It's always been a dream to sort of work in this sort of professional way. I don't know if most people know this, but like a lot of artists, especially who work with Pro Tools or who work professionally with music, they'll just like have their stuff with them on a hard drive and just bop around and they don't even use their own computer. So that was something I was interested in trying to do, is really just sort of try this contemporary approach to making music and seeing what the pros and cons are, as opposed to staying home and just making it all in my studio. And, that’s that. I really wanted to try this thing of going out and seek the vocalist, and working in LA, working in some remote town in California, or working in San Francisco, and yeah. Just trying to sew something together.
Fuzzer: Awesome! And I can only imagine moving around from studio to studio, you would be able to get different types of inspiration creatively through that rather than staying put in your own studio yourself.
Toro y Moi: Yeah, it's cool.
Fuzzer: And you've obviously had such an extensive and incredible career - what's one of the biggest lessons you've learnt or one of the biggest pieces of advice that you've been given that has stuck with you in your career in general?
Toro y Moi: There’s a lot but I think for me, I think the one I'm repeating the most in my head these days is along the lines of, it sounds a bit uninformed but I would tell myself, at least from the past, to not worry about money. It just blocks the emotions that come from that stress of money, it really blocked opportunities from coming your way. It's a little bit of that fake it till you make it, mixed with invest in yourself, mixed with trust your gut and you know, if buying that $2,000 computer is really going to get you something much more than that, then yeah, it's totally worth it! And I remember so many times in my career, like over 10 years ago where I was like “this is crazy” you know. Like “Am I an artist? Am I really a professional?” Like “Yeah, you are. You just have to do it” (laughs). So it's like, that's the thing I would say.
Fuzzer: Yeah, a little bit of that imposter syndrome sinking in.
Toro y Moi: Exactly.
Fuzzer: Yeah, I love that answer. And what music are you listening to at the moment? Are there any new artists or songs that you recommend that we listen to?
Toro y Moi: Yeah, there's a lot of my friends make music right now. For example, my friend Spelling has some new music out.
Fuzzer: Sick, we’ll make sure to have a listen! And last question for you - we know you've got a couple of shows coming up in the US, and then you're heading to Europe next year. What are you looking forward to most about those performances?
Toro y Moi: Yeah, I love just traveling and feeling the pace of of the world, just being there with people. It's really not much to it when we're there and when we're doing that stuff. So yeah, just looking forward to the overall travel and seeing everybody's faces and dancing with everyone.
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