Isaac Dunbar Takes Our Pop Quiz
office gave Isaac an impromptu pop quiz where there are no wrong answers... except, of course, the wrong ones.
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office gave Isaac an impromptu pop quiz where there are no wrong answers... except, of course, the wrong ones.
His debut album was recorded over the past year with a small circle of collaborators, including KbeaZy, Omer Fedi, and Blake Slatkin, the album details the complexities of living the rockstar lifestyle and proves 24kGoldn is out to make music that is reflective of today’s gen Z and millennials.
The album’s success is bolstered, in part, by the breakout single “Mood” featuring Iann Dior, which captured the masses and became a cultural phenomenon. The song spent 8 weeks at number 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and on the Pop radio chart, where it set the record for most spun song in a 7 day period.
Check out our exclusive interview with 24kGoldn below.
First things first, walk me through the moment when your first single blew up. Where was your head at? What were you thinking? How did you react in that moment?
So a lot of people know me from ‘mood’ which makes sense because it was the biggest song in the world for like 2 months. I had no idea that was gonna happen at all. Some people might not know that I also made this song ‘valentino’ which was pretty big in the summer of 2019 and that was my first song ever that blew up. I always remember hearing about rappers randomly blowing up and I always thought it was bullshit. I always thought, ‘they got someone paying for them or some ads there's no way your song could just blow up' and then boom a couple of years later, here I am, just turned 18 years old, I’ve been sitting on that song ‘Valentino’ for like 2 years at that point.
Nothing happened for like 7 months, people were vibing with it but it didn’t go crazy, and then one day after I get my Wisdom teeth taken out I’m just chilling at the crib and this is like the start of TikTok. I’m checking the videos made to my song because I had gotten my wisdom teeth taken out and there was nothing else I could do, I’ve been in bed all day. So I do that and I notice it’s going up and boom my song just starts going crazy on TikTok because this random girl made a video for it. So that was my first time having a song blow up and it was so surreal because I couldn’t even believe that that was something that could happen. Every day I’m just seeing the numbers get higher and higher and then people started following me and checking out my other videos and I started building a fan base. I was just like ‘damn this is cool' and I’m glad this was the path I decided to choose.
Your debut album ‘El Dorado’ Can be labelled as a crossover between many genres. What makes this such an irresistible combination for yourself and the consumer?
I’m strongly gen Z, I was born in 2000 and I’m as close as you can get to being gen Z. So with our generation, we have an aversion to labels, we don’t like to be put in a box. People be getting into open relationships now and we have all of these new terms like with sexualities and genders. Like, with that whole state of mind of moving forward like yo it doesn’t matter what you call it, it just matters what it is. That’s how people are starting to feel about music. When our parents and older siblings were growing up they didn’t have the same access to music. If you wanted to listen to some shit you had to beg your mama to take you to the store, she's gonna give you 20 bucks to pick out 1 CD maybe 2.
So because of that, they didn’t get the same cross exposure, you’re either gonna pick the rap side or the rock side at that point. That's how it was, you pick a side, but now people don’t gotta pick a side, you can go on Youtube to listen to a jazz song then listen to a trap song or even a country song. Spotify has everything, you can make a bunch of different playlists together, so I’m just a product of that generation that doesn’t give a fuck about labels, I just give a fuck about good music.
Yeah and then the definition of music consumption has changed over the past few years. How do you feel like you as an artist witnessed that evolution?
Like, the way we consume it, different genres, more experimental stuff. I think that music plays a huge role in the state of music and where we’re at with it today because now people can make something at home on their computer or in the studio in their local town. Then they can put it on the internet and then be able to connect with audiences that give a fuck about what you have to say and the type of music you’re making. For me, I’m from the bay in San Francisco, California and I’m super proud of it, as I was coming up you know being a 15 year old and having this influence from all these different genres, all these different places, my music didn’t sound like typical bay music which kind of threw people off.
The bay likes to lift up its people but I think people were just confused at first because they were like ‘is he from the bay or what? It doesn’t sound like bay music’ so even though I wasn’t able to take over my local area fully at the time you know, now it’s a different situation. When you are the biggest out of the area everyone just wants to support you based just on your strength. Before, outside of my high school and like local kids and other kids my age that grew up listening to all types of music, not a lot of people got it. I had to go to the internet to find my fans and find people who appreciated my music and now it turns out that all over the world I got people in Brazil, Turkey, Japan, and Australia and that’s a beautiful thing.
So In your Rolling Stones interview back in February, I saw that you were the self proclaimed “Steve Jobs of the music industry right now.” Which I thought that a very bold statement, but I also thought it was f*cking great. Where does that confidence come from and how can you be so sure that you have that IT factor?
I mean, I’ve been me my whole life so I know what I’m capable of and I know the challenges, I overcame them, and the way that my mind thinks. The reason I said that was because I’m not afraid of innovation, a lot of people like to play it safe and do what’s been done before. I’m like ‘no, I’m coming in the game and I’m trying to make a whole new genre of music you know?’ I’m coming into the game saying ‘oh, everybody is thinking TikTok is corny in 2019 well, I just seen the biggest song in the world ‘uptown road’ come about off of that app so let me go see what’s going on’ now everybody else is on my bandwagon. I’m the only one that’s messaging fans every day and trying to build genuine relationships with people that fuck with me. I’m just coming at this shit for a whole other angle and that’s exactly what Steve Jobs was doing back in design.
I know that you’ve experimented with different genres in the past and it seems like you’re exploring your sound and just having fun with the whole musical process. So what ties each track in your latest album together and what are the core elements?
I think something that made this debut album special was the production on it. I’m blessed that I get to work with incredible producers out here in LA and almost all the songs on my album were produced by either Omer, Blake, KBeaZy - usually all 3 of them together. In the past, I never had the experience of working with a group of producers and creating a whole project. When you do that it gives you a cohesive sound because it’s not just me being the star player out there and having to deal with teammates that don’t know what’s going on. I got a super team and everybody is able to make everything elevated and cohesive.
You’ve set the bar pretty high for yourself in just 2 years.
Yeah, I kind of fucked myself over a little bit, number 1 at 20 years old. I ain’t gonna lie, I was just sitting outside and just looking out at the view like ‘what the fuck am I supposed to do now?’ I thought this shit was gonna take so much longer. I would still be in college by now and I’m achieving all my music dreams so it’s a weird position to be in.
Does this make you nervous at all? Do you feel like you have to continue excelling with each release or are you comfortable?
You know, I think it just depends on the day. You never know what you’re gonna get out of that day, you never know what’s gonna happen. I’m really in the league now, I made it through high school leagues and college leagues and now I’m Ballin with my all-stars and my competition. I don’t see it that way, but we’re competing on the charts. I’ve learned that I have some big shoes to fill but I’m growing into them more and more every day. I’m capable of all that is meant for me.
Yeah and your recent explosion in the music scene made me think of that one scene in The Queen's Gambit when Beth Harmon asks the little kid about what he’ll do after becoming a grandmaster at age 16. His face just goes blank and he doesn’t really have an answer. So my question to you is because you’ve already achieved huge milestones in your career, how much further can you really go and what does success look like to you?
You know lucky for us in the music industry there is a lot less defined criteria in terms of being finished. In chess, once you're the grandmaster that’s it there’s nowhere else to go. With music, it’s something that lives forever, you also have the opportunity to constantly innovate and constantly bring something fresh to the table and still have those songs that meant something to people and it’ll always live on. Even though I achieved number 1, that’s not what I came into the music industry to do, I’m not making music to chase records on the charts.
I make music to impact the lives of people, I make music to make people feel something. I make music for when your girlfriend just broke up with you and you gotta cry on the way home and need something to feel a little comfort or when you’re in Miami for the first time and haven’t been out in months and now you wanna turn the fuck up. That’s why I make music, the accolades and the awards, those are cool and I take that as recognition of work that I’ve been putting in, but that’s not what defines my career and that’s not what my purpose is in music.
I read that you’re really into fashion and that’s very evident with the looks that you’ve been putting out across all social media platforms. I especially like that you’ve been sporting this very streetwear and avant garde look, could you talk about some of your clothing inspirations?
I’ve been waiting for this question! I’ve always been into fashion, I remember being in 6th grade maybe 2010 or 2011 and this was before distressed jeans were the craze. I just saw Kanye West wearing a pair of distressed jeans and some old rock magazines where people were wearing distressed jeans. So I just said ‘fuck it, I’m gonna distress my jeans’ I remember going home and slicing all my jeans with an Exacto knife and plucking the threads out before anyone was doing any customization or DIY stuff. My mom came home and started yelling at me like ‘why are you cutting all of your jeans! What are you doing?’ and I was like ‘mom, it’s fashion you don’t get it!’
That’s when it all started but I’ve always loved sneakers and customizing clothes. As I got older, I had more time to learn about stuff and I love the stories that come with it because every piece means something to somebody. Whether it’s nostalgia, the designer, who gave it to you, you know, the pieces have stories and they’re used to express yourself in ways that words can’t. When you see someone wearing a certain type of outfit you’re like ‘I kind of know this person's vibe already’ you know? I always just wanna put my true self out there and show my true self. So by dressing how I feel like and by what I think is fly, I hope to inspire other people the same way that I was inspired so they can be their own version of fly and own their swag.
Would you ever consider designing your own clothing?
A million percent.
I just wanna circle back to your explosion in success real quick, for some people that might go to their head and throw them off for all the wrong reasons. But for you that doesn’t seem to be the case at all, how do you separate an egotistical attitude from confidence?
So I saw a friend a couple of months ago and he was my friend in high school. I asked him ‘yo how do you think I’ve changed since we were hanging out every day?’ He goes to college now and we don’t see each other often but he told me ‘honestly, you ain’t really changed at all, you were this confident before you had anything going on and now I guess it just makes sense’ So I was like aight, word. So I think that the line between confidence and ego could be very thin.
It’s important to believe in yourself and it’s important to have faith in what you’re doing and be proud of what you’re doing but too much of a good thing is a bad thing. When you’re acting arrogant and your mind is closed and you don’t wanna hear any feedback or criticism, that can lead to your downfall. I always keep that in mind like, I don’t know everything at 20 years old, just because I’m getting big that doesn’t mean I’m good at everything in life. I’m just trying to learn and soak up as much game as possible.
You’re part of a generation that exists in the age of social media, like TikTok, Instagram, and all of these other outlets. Would you prefer to have lived in a different era or are you happy with existing in this generation?
I think this internet, TikTok, social media thing has definitely helped my career and it definitely has given a lot of people careers for better and for worse. I think it would’ve been interesting to have come in a time before social media like the 90s or the late 80s. That was when it was real rockstar shit, people would only see you when paparazzi was snapping a photo of you at an event or when they came to your show. Now, It’s like everybody wants to see who you’re with and what you’re doing and what you’re eating 24/7 and it can get exhausting at times. Social media in general is toxic and one of the worst things to ever happen to humanity but, it’s here now and I have a feeling that it’s not going away anytime soon. You gotta learn to live with it and not let that shit fuck with your head.
What are the next steps for you for the rest of the year? And can you tell us more about the central themes of your upcoming project(s)?
Yeah, so I've been working on a lot of music over the last year and a half. I’ve been working on my deluxe album for the past 3 months. I have some cool features on there, Lil Tecca, Lil Yachty, and I was just in the studio with Jason Derulo till like 6 AM last night, maybe he’ll be on it! So I can’t wait for that to come out and for people to hear it and I can’t wait for my tour this year. I also just recently sold a TV show and they’re writing it right now, and it'll be about my life. It's kind of like Entourage meets Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and it takes place when I leave college to pursue music, moving to this crazy 90210 Beverly Hills mansion with one of my friends that I met at college and it’s just about all of the crazy shit that we get into.
The release of “peppermint” is accompanied by a video directed and edited by Tommy herself. Which sees Tommy decked out in corsets and mesh in the desert, with her signature blonde locks, draped atop a white Lamborghini as she proclaims, “I’m the bitch that’s born again, In my bag, on the cover of magazines, / no flex cause I'm underground and mainstream..."
Check out our exclusive interview with Tommy below.
First things first, we're (obviously) in a global pandemic. How has it been for you in lockdown? What have you been doing with your time?
Making this album. Honestly it gave me a chance to really sit with the music and get really deep, dark and dirty with myself. I also got a puppy and that’s brought me pure joy, his name is Rumi, after the poet.
So I saw that you directed and edited the video for “peppermint." What was that process like and did you like having full creative control?
I need creative control. I can’t sleep at night if I don’t have creative control. For me, the process begins with the idea, which turns into the treatment, hiring a team, showing up, executing everything as genuinely as you can. Then directing it — but then going home and shifting through hours of footage to make it. I couldn’t imagine just showing up and leaving the rest to someone else, I'm not a model, I’m an artist. So, for me it’s important to control the idea from the conceptual stage all the way until something real is born and delivered to my fans. Honestly it’s one of the only things that will keep me up at night, not having creative control. I just refuse to live that way.
The music video for peppermint beautifully represents the aura of your lyrics - could you talk us through the production of this video?
So peppermint is really like “I’m the bitch that’s born again” and it’s like, if I’m gonna come back, I mind as well come back. For me, I feel like there’s a lot in the song that I feel like I just claimed you know? I just say some weird shit after that. I feel like I’m still playing but I’m kind of like yeah, ‘I know I’m underground’ but I’m here now. I feel like this whole album is me standing up a little bit and being like, well, no ones gonna claim this for me, so I might as well just claim my spot because I really feel like I haven’t really tried to before. I feel like in peppermint I have, even though I’m still subtle with it, I still have a bit more that I wanna come for.
This is your first single in two years, could I ask you why you took such a long break and did covid have anything to do with prolonging any of your projects?
It was honestly a label situation, I was with two labels that broke apart and then the label that I stayed with wasn’t really there for me for 2 years. So I’ve always been making music but I’m finally in a good place with them and they’ve been really great with this last project and everythings working again. So I’m able to put it out and it’s my last album with them. So yeah, that kind of attributed to it all but of course when Covid hit it’s just been a whole year of not really being able to put anything out, like you can, but people would advise you to wait on it because they didn’t know the future. Everyone was so afraid and for me, I was like "I’m not gonna push anything, I’m just gonna keep making shit." And I ended up finishing the album, so it all worked out.
So how is your writing process? Do you go to the studio and sit and write, or is it kind of happening as part of your day I guess? Is there a border or not really?
So for this album I really wrote most of it in the studio but not with any intention. Some of the songs like the Charlie Heat songs, we had sessions at his studios and those were just some songs that we made in a few sessions. We literally made those songs in like two days, which is crazy. Like, for peppermint I wrote it right away and never touched it again. Like, a lot of the songs that I’ve made one time in the studio, once you have the song you go in again, like, even though my lyrics or my vocals are recorded once, I still go back into the song and see if we need to any more instruments, do we need to take something away, you know and then you have to mix it and then you have to master it.
Correct me if I’m wrong but Identity, power, and rebirth seem to be the core elements of this song. Why are these elements important for you to explore?
I think rebirth for sure and then I think every person has their own power, you know? Everyone has a power and it’s just like 'how much of it do you want to claim? Like what do you want it to look like and who do you wanna be?' For me as an artist, I always play with taking the driver's seat back. I always play with being in control and being super dominant and being really submissive, and even with the hook in peppermint where it’s like “I’m the type to take your money, take your soul, I leave no fingerprint.” Like, for me that’s not about fucking over somebdoy, it’s about, “I know you can’t touch me” and really just feeling myself, like I can go here, i can go there, and I can decide when I wanna leave and so it’s definitely about power. It’s also about saying whatever the fuck I want, like, I didn’t really plan it, I just sat down and wrote it.
I love that your music and videos have this very “f*ck you, I’m gonna do me” attitude, where does that stem from and how do you attain a bad bitch aura?
Honestly, I don’t even think about it. Like, when I’m in my video doing that there are a lot of shots of me laughing and smiling, I just don’t use them. So it’s almost like yeah, that’s part of it, being that way and feeling myself and doing that. Which is why for me editing is so important because I literally control the mood with the editing. I’m such an energy person that I just choose the bad bitch energy. I’m drawn to it, I like to feel that way, I like to feel powerful and not so much bad bitch, but like, I’m here and why be soft? It’s still really vulnerable for me though, like, I still feel vulnerable. But yeah, it’s not really a front, it’s a part of me.
I’m very curious about the lyric, “I’m next but not part of the hypocrisy,” what does this mean to you?
I was just thinking about how a lot of rappers don’t write their own music. It’s about “I’m next” but I’m not a part of this system or a creation from someone else. I’m just myself and I write my own songs.
What kind of feeling dominates when you listen to your music or what do you want your listeners to feel when they listen to your music?
First of all, I just love my fans and I love my listeners! I want them to feel empowered, I want them to feel like whoever they are, that’s good enough. They don’t need to be anyone else and I want them to feel fucking empowered. Like, they could be that bitch on a car if they wanted to be. It’s not all about me — like it is, it’s how I channel, my music is through me. It’s through my perspective, but I keep making music because I meet people who have gotten me through this or you know "This helped me when I wasn’t feeling myself and then now I feel so much more confident." Or "you inspired me to make music" or just like "I like to play your shit when I’m going out." like, anything like that. It just makes it so worth it because then otherwise I’m just sitting here listening to my own music. Like for me, I don’t really listen to my music like that, for me it’s like I need to make the song because I’m going through it and I need to make it. And then I’ll listen to it a few times afterwards and then I’m good.
Lastly, imagine covid ends tomorrow, what’s the first thing that you would do?
I haven’t seen my family in Canada for a year, so I would definitely go and visit my family.
So how did you get started with music? Have you always had the gene in your family?
Yeah. I always had a musical gene in the family. My dad was a musician, but I always assumed he didn't want to do that professionaly. But when I got older, I kind of realized that he really did. And that that was his goal. He just kind of pushed it down a little bit. So it was cool to do something like that for my dad, not that he's the reason why I made music or stuck with making actual music, but I would say he built fundamentals in me to be musically skilled in the future.
Was it always your goal?
I was always playing instruments, but I wasn't making songs, you know? And then I got super into skateboarding and I thought I was going to be like a professional paintball player for a bit. I just had so many different interests that I thought, yeah, these will all be things I'll do professionally. But music was the one constant thing. And then I started really gravitating towards it. In eighth grade I started recording myself and it just started from there. And then my friends were like, "Oh, this is pretty good." I used to hang out at this older guy's house. He was like 25. I was like 16. And he used to have people in and out of the house often. I had just made my first song and he would have me play it for everyone who came in the house. And then all these adults were like telling me like "Oh, you're like actually pretty good." So then that's when I was like 'maybe I should start doing this a little bit more seriously.'
In those early stages, were you still trying to figure out your own sound?
Yeah. I started by just completely aping and copying other artists. Figuring out how to dissect the styles of other people so that I could make my own unique style. And it was a big problem when I first started. Cause I would just straight, blatantly copy people. I wouldn't even try to make it mine. I was really into making Chief Keef type drill music for a little while. And then I had a buddy pull me aside at a party and he was like, "Dude, why do you do this? That's just not who you are as a human and who you are as a human is pretty interesting. Focus on making music that really resonates with you and shows who you are, it'll be a whole lot more interesting and authentic." And that was a big turning point in late high school where I stopped doing that. And I started focusing on just being myself. Cause that's the one advantage you have is that you're yourself and that's different than everyone else. So you can always make up your own authentic cool thing.
Who inspires you musically?
The Cure is probably at the top. Top favorite band ever. I listened to a lot of bands, but it's gotta be — number one and number two musicians, Robert Smith and Young thug. So it's a pretty drastic difference between the two, but at the same time, they're both really good at melodies and like you feel sad or making you feel happy.
What was it like collaborating with Travis Barker on your new single? Did he have an influence on the alternative rock sound of it?
Well I've just always been that way. And that was the idea before we met Travis, to take it to an alternative sort of realm. Cause that's more just me. I always was into that stuff. You know, when I was a kid, I didn't even listen to rap music really. Like until I was in high school, I was wearing eyeliner to school in elementary school. So this is just more like a true form of me. And then getting to meet Travis has really amplified that out of me, like times 10. So I've gotten to really express myself because he has the production to where I can make songs that I dreamed about making, but I didn't like know how to make the production behind, you know?
How did you guys link up?
He DM'd me on Instagram and he heard one of my songs and really liked it. We just talked for a little bit about music and stuff and you know, I was like "Oh, I'll try not to fanboy out or nothing." Cause I am a really big Blink [182] fan. And like we just kept in contact, kept close since then I've done some more sessions with him and every time we do it, it's so easy. We get in the studio and it's like ridiculously easy, and I have a hard time making songs most of the time. So it's like when I step in there with him, we can bang a song out in like a few hours.
I really like the video. Tell me about the process behind it.
I mean the process is super interesting because the guys Richard Quintero and Kheyber Jones who shot it used to go to the same skate park that I went to when I was eight years old. And like, we all know the same skaters. They're older than me, they were the teenagers when I was like eight. They filmed a bunch of skate videos and stuff like that for people in the New York, New Jersey area. And then they had never done a music video before and we just really liked their skate film stuff. So we thought they'dl kill it. And so they gave it a shot and they did it, you know, they hit it out of the park.
This single is ahead of an EP down the line. Is there anything you'd say to the reader about what to look forward to?
It's gonna be a good EP! I'm really just so proud of the work that everyone's put into this project. And like, the time we waited to put it out, you know, I feel like the timing is perfect and, I don't know man...I'm just excited to finally put out music that I'm really, really proud of. And I think that other people will enjoy, I feel like it'll be music that's somewhat familiar, like in a weird, nostalgic sense, but also something that is a new and different. A good, weird thing you've never heard before, like a treat you've never tasted before or something. You'll like it, even though it's different.