TJ Stafford – Nipple Whisk

By starrymag | December 12, 2022

By: Jamie Steinberg

 

 

Q) How would you describe your sound?

 

A) Putting it in writing, I’d say slightly off-center rock: lyrics, chord progressions, arrangements, all slightly…off. In person though, if I’m asked, I usually just say “It’s rock.” And that usually suffices because no one makes rock anymore, so it’s usually seen as novel.

 

Q) Who are some of your musical influences?

 

A) My psychological state is my biggest musical influence. What does my current psychosis sound like? Musically, this current album was influenced by the more flippant side of 90’s/early 00’s rock. Fountains of Wayne, Presidents of the United States of America, Pixies, Dinosaur Jr. – stuff like that. Stuff that existed in that gray area of “are they serious, are they joking, are they angry, are they joking about anger?” I like those gray areas and the sounds they produce.

 

Q) Talk about the story behind your new song “The Astronaut.”

 

A) Writing it out makes it seem so trite, but the impetus was my frustration with social media. I mean, FUCK Tik Tok. And also, it’s the most important music distribution platform in the world right now. So, yeah, let’s say you’re a well-adjusted human being who sees most social media platforms as the cesspools that they are, or you’re an introvert who is appalled at the idea of talking into a camera about what you see as very inane things not worth words, and you decide to forgo all that nonsense to stay ‘true’ to yourself – barring some lightning strike of discovery where Beyonce deems you the next best – you’ve just denied yourself access to 98% of all music fans. Which one could take as you not REALLY caring about making it as an artist. Flipside, let’s say you’re the same aforementioned person and you decide to swallow your pride and put yourself out there on social media, how do you do it honestly without needing to scrub yourself with some bleach and a pumice stone afterward?

 

Q) How will the video for the track play into the message behind it?

 

A) The video is first and foremost fun. Because this shit should be fun. But also, hopefully it leaves people wondering what our role and purpose and motivation is in creating all of the “content.” Are we showing people who we truly are? Or how we think we should be? And are producing from abundance, or are we seeking to fill an emotional void with likes, and catering to those likes? The world wants to be “influencers” as an end in and of itself. But what are we influencing people to do? If there’s not a purpose behind it, then “influencing” just means we want some semblance of control over people, period.

And also – and I want to make sure people know that the following is not lost on me – the video is an exploration of my hypocrisy in all of it. I mean, on one level it’s making fun of the whole social media/influencer ecosystem, while creating something that hopefully gets a lot of attention in that very same ecosystem. And It’s admitting that no one REALLY cares about any of the stuff that they like or follow, while at the same time tacitly asking people to like it and caring about the outcome. I mean, what a mess. No wonder people are depressed.

BUT…per my first point, this video is fun. Hopefully that’s enough.

 

Q) What is your song writing process? Do you need music before you can create lyrics?

 

A) My process is work. I treat it like work. I wasted so much time in my earlier years waiting for inspiration and being overly precious with songs that came out of said inspiration. Then, I’d end up wondering why I wasn’t creating more. Now, I treat it like work. “Inspiration” tends to show up if when I show up regardless of my levels of motivation. Practically this looks like blocking out specific time, grabbing a guitar, playing random shit and mumbling incoherent melodies and sounds until something emerges. Then, I run with whatever comes until a music/melody is finished. Next, I add lyrics until the song is finished. And I don’t judge it. I just let it be and move on to the next song. Judging and editing happen when I’ve got a body of songs to work with. Then, I judge like a pessimistic mother-in-law and edit the shit out of stuff. Nothing is precious. Every song is worthy of a beheading.

 

Q) How much of a hand do you have in the production of your music?

 

A) A large shaky hand. I usually have an idea of the overall auditory aesthetic I want. Dusty Moon, the producer of this album, is one of the few people I trust with bringing that to life. He has no filters creatively, and he has the least amount of ego of anyone I’ve ever met in the music industry. Meaning, if I’m not feeling one of his ideas or I think we should tweak it, he NEVER takes it personally and just wants to see the vision of the album come to life. At the same time, he’s never afraid to be like “we should do this really weird thing here.” It’s very freeing. And if a certain song is begging for something that doesn’t fit with the rest of the songs, that’s ok. We do what the song wants.

 

Q) “The Astronaut” is off your forthcoming album Nipple Whisk. Where does the title stem from?

 

A) Actually, the phrase came from a picture (and associated story) that surfaced on a text thread after a really good friend died of cancer this year. It was wanting to honor that friend somehow without playing on the melodrama and sadness of the experience because my friend was the opposite of melodramatic and sad. So, fuck associating him with sadness. Here’s a nipple whisk.

I mean, the phrase is funny by itself. And on the next level there’s a funny story associated with it. And on the next level, that story involves a friend who died from a random cancer that was the result of some random fucked up DNA. The album title kinda feels like life in general, in that way. It’s funny and beautiful and sad and tragic all at the same time.

 

Q) What song(s) on the album hold a special significance for you and what makes the so important to you?

 

A) “The World’s Gonna Love Me” and “The Astronaut” both hold that spot. For one, there was a lot of freedom in writing them, especially lyrically. They both come from pretty serious introspective spots but acknowledge the ridiculous parts of the questions they’re dealing with. Acknowledging and playing with the full breadth of the human experience is a lot of fun and opens the creative process up to a lot of really cool possibilities. I mean, the pre-choruses of “The Astronaut” are basically stream of consciousness nonsense, yet somehow they make sense in the context of the song, and they ended up being some of the favorite lyrics I’ve ever written.

 

Q) Which tracks off the album are you looking forward to performing live?

 

A) “The World’s Gonna Love Me” has really cool live performance possibilities given that its sections are so disparate. But they’re all gonna be fun. Playing rock songs live is never boring.

 

Q) What do you hope listeners take away from exploring your upcoming album as a whole?

 

A) I hope they have hooks stuck in their heads and that what people take away is all over the map. The album as a whole kind of exists in that space of ambiguous meaning. There are so many on the album that could be taken as hopeful or pessimistic depending on how you come into it as a listener. The first verse of “The World’s Gonna Love Me” is a great example. I talk about crying by myself in the bathroom but filming myself to see if I look like a movie star while I’m doing it. That’s both really sad, and also really hilarious. And is crying in the bathroom alone the sad part, or filming myself while doing it? Or does filming it bring levity to it and take some of the pressure off the initial sadness? I don’t actually know. Could be any of those options. Life, like this album, could be almost any or all options at any given moment.

 

Q) Where are some of your favorite places to perform and what makes those locations so significant to you?

 

A) I have a soft spot for the Hollywood venues: The Troubadour, The Roxy, etc. I’ve played those venues in a multitude of capacities since I was essentially a kid.

 

Q) Some of your music has been featured on iconic television series like “The Walking Dead,” HBO’s “True Blood,” NBC’s “Parenthood” and FX’s “Sons of Anarchy.” What does this kind of achievement mean to you?

 

A) It means money. Paying bills is way better than not paying bills. Sleeping in a bed that I own in a dedicated housing structure I pay for is way better that living in a car. And I don’t mean that to sound callous. There is eternal gratitude attached to that statement.

 

Q) Who would you most like to collaborate with on a song in the future?

 

A) Musically? No one. I don’t work well with others. Co-writing is really exhausting to me. I don’t like it and I’m not very good at it. My introverted self gets drained almost immediately.

If I were to collaborate with someone in the future, I’d want it to be with someone outside of the music industry. Like, if I could create an album that accompanies a Mark Danielewsky novel or an Adam Levin novel – I’d lose my shit. Like maybe in the vein of Dark Side of the Moon/The Wizard of Oz – was it actually on purpose? Why does this album line up so perfectly with this piece of literature? Is it because I’m high? Am I high? That kind of thing.

 

Q) What would you like to say to everyone who is a fan and supporter of you and your work?

 

A) Oh man…thank you! But “thank you” doesn’t really do it justice. To have someone willingly choose to listen to my creations is really baffling to me. And not baffling, like, “why would they,” because my stuff is good, so that makes sense. But just the idea that someone makes a choice, not out of necessity – like purchasing toilet paper – but out of pure impractical pleasure or connection. How honoring is that? Even if I do believe my stuff to be worth listening to, still, how honoring that someone would choose to do that?