This is the first interview with TOBACCO in 8 years, and this could have never been accomplished without the help of Jared, organizer of Expansion, and beloved WRFL DJ.
Note that both Lucas and I, who got to hold the interview, are typically short on luck. Well, I don’t know about Lucas, but I know I am. Knowing this, I fully was not expecting for us to actually land this interview, so as my luck continues to be down, the one interview I wasn’t prepared for is the one that happened.
Our nerves strung, we got to talk to and learn more about TOBACCO, with his manager keeping eyes over us as he watched down from a forklift that of course had to be there. What’s the first interview in 8 years with an elusive artist without a forklift?
Anyways, I’ve talked long enough. Thank you Jared, thank you Lucas, thank you TOBACCO, and thank you WRFL.
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TOBACCO started out in the band Black Moth Super Rainbow, a Psychedelic/ Rock/ Indie band from Pittsburgh. He left the group when he wanted to start something new, to be with those who lined up better with his mindset.
“I was looking for a way to do something different from that and also get away from some of the personalities at the time in the band (Black Moth Super Rainbow). It was kinda stressful in the beginning and being with those people all the time… I needed to do something else to not hate music because I think if you’re with people who really stress you out, it can really take a toll on what you’re doing…”
TOBACCO has changed, of course, as musicians do, as people do. His music becomes more of seeing what he can do, and what obstacles he can now tackle.
“It’s a lot more challenging, we’re gonna play stuff tonight that people just don’t like, but that’s the stuff that we like… That’s not even really by design, I’ve always tried to do stuff that was new and challenging… I think I got really lucky ten years ago when there was this accidental intersection of me making something I want to make anyways and people actually liking it, like it wasn’t by design. And it just stuck and so now I’m so far beyond that that I’m at the point where I’m making stuff that people really don’t like… There’s just stuff where, it’s just not inviting, it’s- I didn’t know what people liked about me in the beginning until I started doing stuff that people don’t like.”
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“People do change, and you can’t make the same music over and over again. It’s like that- I’ve done that. I’ve achieved that and now there are these new things that I wanna achieve and there’s this one song in particular (Bitchass Moon)… I’m so proud of it, it’s like this thing I’ve been dreaming up for a couple of years and I had no idea how to make it happen and then once I made it made it happen, everyone was like ‘he has to be trolling us.’ Like ‘there’s no way he thinks this is good’ and it’s like, yeah, this is the coolest thing I’ve done.”
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“It’s (Bitchass Moon) on the last album I put out and I kinda made it so it’s like it feels- I wanted it to feel like a roller coaster or somethin… I think it’s silly to say something sounds like getting high. I don’t like weed, I get really bad feelings from it. I get the roller coaster feeling like my heart rate, it comes up, and it starts going really fast and then I come down and it’s almost like I’m asleep. I hate this feeling. I wanted to make a song that kinda felt like that. And that’s what that is.”
With Aphex Twin being inspiration to TOBACCO, the world of what he creates next is infinite and exciting. Fans know that they will always hear TOBACCO, whether it’s what they want or not, he will bring himself fully into his music, and create things that may not be in our imagination.