<\/p>\n
\n\tIt\u2019s a rainy afternoon in Los Angeles, and listening to the new TEED album during a crosstown drive shapes the grey into a moody ambience, like melancholy laced with longing and a beat, with the cumulative effect making even the stop\/start traffic feel vibey.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cTo me, it\u2019s romantic,\u201d TEED himself says upon sitting down at a Hollywood lunch spot, where he orders a turkey club and black tea. Dressed for the weather in jeans and a brown leather jacket, he looks like a colder-climate version of the character he\u2019s been channeling in the promo materials for his third album, Always With Me<\/em> \u2014 out Friday (Dec. 5) via The Orchard and his own label, Nice Age.<\/p>\n \n\tIn these music videos and IG posts, he plays a sort of serious man on vacation, with imagery finding him in beachy locations gazing seriously<\/a> towards the sea. The aesthetic is a sort of adult take on the summer vacations the Los Angeles-based, U.K.-born artist, whose real name is Orlando Higginbottom, took as a child, when his big family piled in the car and drove to France, where his mother is from.<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cWe\u2019d take two days to get there, and I\u2019d have my headphones on for two days, and it would be like my own little hero\u2019s journey, this sort of transformation,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019d be in the mountains for a month, and my imagination would go off\u2026 Lots of dreaming happened on holiday.\u201d Years later and thousands of miles away, he\u2019s tried weaving the afterglow of these memories into the album\u2019s 11 tracks and, through them, passing the feeling forward: \u201cI hope that it\u2019s dreamy for people,\u201d he says, \u201cand that it makes them daydream.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tThe music is transportive, and in a more practical sense it\u2019s also helped deliver Higginbottom\u2019s project to its latest incarnation, with the artist long known as Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs now just going by TEED. The way he tells it the decision was both natural \u2014 a lot of people have always just called him TEED anyways \u2014 and a function of a more adult hero\u2019s journey that\u2019s brought him through the mad success of his 2012 debut, Trouble<\/em>, through the strange wilderness of the music industry and his subsequent rejection of it, with a decade passing between Trouble <\/em>and its 2022 followup, When The Lights Go<\/em>. Amid it all there were \u201csome real low points,\u201d sobriety achieved during the pandemic, and now, a new body of work.<\/p>\n \n\tAlways With Me <\/em>comes at moment when the music industry is distinctly different from the era in which TEED started releasing music. \u201cI think strategy has become as much of a conversation, if not more of a conversation, than the actual art,\u201d he says. \u201cEveryone is a marketing expert. We\u2019re watching the marketing as art now, which is really funny. It\u2019s really strange. I don\u2019t like it. We\u2019re clapping for people\u2019s strategy. Can we just listen to the song and applaud that?\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tBut now older and wiser \u2014 and settled into nice working relationships with The Orchard, through which he releases music, and his team at Jet Management (a place he calls \u201ccalm\u201d) \u2014 one gets the sense that TEED is watching it all now with a sort of distanced amusement that\u2019s created the space for him to make the stylish and thoughtful songs that make up his new album. While he confesses he\u2019s \u201cfailed completely\u201d at making a club record, he\u2019s making it work on the road, with his current headlining tour taking him across the U.S. until Dec. 20 and picking up in Australia around the new year.<\/p>\n \n\tBelow, he talks about it all.<\/p>\n \n\tYour new album is really gorgeous. What is it about?<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tIt\u2019s a less self-involved record than the last one. There\u2019s a bit of course-correction, in a way. I often wonder if we all just make records to apologize for the last one we put out. I feel like that\u2019s partly what\u2019s going on here. I wanted to make something lighter, warmer, less heavy, a more enjoyable listen. I realized that actually, what I asked from people listening to the last one was like, \u201cDo you want to come down to my murky, sad little cabin with me and listen to my sadness?\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tIs that what you\u2019re apologizing for?<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tKind of. I wanted to do something that was a nicer listen, basically, so you start from that point of view. It was less self-involved in my present \u2014 I was thinking about long-gone past things\u2026 You explore ideas, but it\u2019s how those ideas make you feel. So I was thinking about a thing, then about how that thing makes me feel. Then I made the music. So it\u2019s not like I put the actual idea I was thinking about directly into the music, it\u2019s the secondary feeling.<\/p>\n \n\tBreak that down a bit for me. <\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tOne of the things I\u2019ve been slightly obsessing about is the tone of an emotion. My version of the blues is different from your version of the blues. We both had a first experience with the romantic blues at some point in our lives, and a pin got set in the ground and in our emotional map. For me, the color of that first experience has resonated all the way through my life. And it\u2019s so bizarre, because your first experience of the blues might be so different, or it might be the same. I just don\u2019t know.<\/p>\n \n\tBut a lot of these big first romantic feelings and awakenings, I realized, happened during summer holidays. So this is the through line. Once I started thinking about it, I was like, \u201cThis is the world I\u2019m going to build, and I\u2019m going think about this, and I\u2019m going angle things that are a bit over here a bit more towards this.\u201d So some theme appears slowly, and then I go, \u201cThat\u2019s what I\u2019m gonna do.\u201d So there\u2019s, like, 60% of a record that looks a bit like that, and then I push everything else in that direction.<\/p>\n \n\tI was wondering where this kind of \u201csad guy on vacation\u201d aesthetic that\u2019s present in the rollout materials came from.<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\t[Laughs<\/em>.] If I could present as happy, believe me, I would, but it is almost impossible for me. I mean, like, I\u2019m smiling at the moment \u2014 because this is a nice natural thing for me to do \u2014 but if you put a camera in front of me, I can\u2019t do it.<\/p>\n \n\tWhy?<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tI don\u2019t know. Because I\u2019m British? I just present as disappointed. I think I have resting disappointment face.<\/p>\n \n\tThere were 10 years between your first two albums, then three years between this one and the last one. Tell me about that timeline, and if there was anything to that longer gap and then this shorter one.<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tWell, the longer gap is difficult for me to talk about, because it was just s\u2013tty. I guess I lost my way, got pretty depressed for a bit, couldn\u2019t figure out the music industry, was very confused by my first experience with my first album and the success of that. I didn\u2019t have the means to understand that it was successful and how far it had gone. I didn\u2019t have any perspective on it.<\/p>\n \n\tWhy?<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tI was either unable to hear what people were saying to me, or no one said the right things to me. I was just like, \u201cF\u2013k this. I want to disappear for a bit.\u201d I\u2019d had a weird time releasing with Universal, like everyone does. Then I sort of spiraled for a long time. I was having a reasonable time, but it was also very hard, and there were some real low points. I found my way out, basically, thanks to the pandemic and thanks to a stubbornness and sort of \u201cf\u2013k it\u201d attitude, which I managed to pick back up again. I\u2019d always had that when I was growing up, then suddenly it was knocked out of me somehow.<\/p>\n \n\tWhat did the \u201cf\u2013k it\u201d attitude turn into caring too much?<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tYou just lose it. You lose the sparkiness. You lose the silliness. You have to be goofy to survive this thing. There has to be a little bit of \u201cWell, who cares?\u201d But it all became too serious, and too big and too heavy. I went round and met all the managers at one point when I didn\u2019t have management. I knew enough about the music industry to know that everyone was lying to me at a certain point in the conversation. Nice people, but they all bulls\u2013tted me. So I was like, \u201cWell, I\u2019m not gonna work with any of you guys. This is depressing.\u201d There\u2019s a sort of learning curve in the game.<\/p>\n \n\tSo what did you do?<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tIt definitely helped that I sobered up in 2020 or 2021. I got that album out, self-released it, worked with The Orchard, which actually changed my whole thing, because I was the record label. They were super supportive. They gave me the marketing money I needed to do everything. So actually, I found a version of the music industry that made me feel safe, and it was [The Orchard]. I love them; I\u2019m working with them again on this record. They love me, it\u2019s great. They haven\u2019t made any money out of me, but they\u2019re supportive, and they know they will one day, or they think they will one day.<\/p>\n \n\tCan you give me an example of a lie someone told you, in all those conversations with potential management?<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tWho their clients are, who they manage. They lie about what kind of deals they\u2019ve gotten for people. They\u2019ll lie about the people they know. They\u2019ll say, \u201cOh, I\u2019m best friends with this person.\u201d It\u2019s like, \u201cI know that person very well.\u201d I\u2019d call them afterwards like \u201cDo know this manager?\u201d \u201cNo, met him once four years ago.\u201d Where I\u2019m at now, I see it very clearly, and I can kind of find my way through it. But at the time, because I was in a very vulnerable place, I was like, \u201cNo, I can\u2019t be around this thing.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tSo you kind of rejected the whole thing.<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tI kind of rejected the whole thing. I could go on about that whole thing for a long time. It was lost years, in a way. There were definitely albums I made that never came out. I was always making music. It wasn\u2019t a creative block. It was like the final action of putting music out was the hard thing. <\/p>\n \n\tWas there a turning point?<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tI had a birthday in 2018, and a friend texted me that day and said, \u201cDo something for yourself today.\u201d I was like, \u201cI\u2019m going to put some music out.\u201d I\u2019d been into every room I wanted to go into with these two unreleased songs I had. Everyone wanted to hear them, and I just put one of them up on SoundCloud that day. The artwork was me eating a banana in the mirror.<\/p>\n \n\tThat was a huge release for me, personally\u00a0\u2014 because I\u2019d been holding on, and I put it out, and people loved it. I went out that day and partied with my friends, and I got home and realized that I\u2019d released music again, after not putting anything out for five years. I just burst into tears for hours. It was great. It was just like, \u201cOh, here we are. That\u2019s what I that\u2019s what I\u2019m supposed to do. I\u2019m supposed to put stuff out, whether I\u2019m sure of it or not.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tSo the actual like time spent making the music for this new album, set that scene for me. Was there a typical sort of day? <\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tMy ideal day is that I get up, immediately go and listen to what I did the day before, have a coffee, then go do some exercise and spend the rest of the day making music. I love that, and it doesn\u2019t go unappreciated. I\u2019m so grateful that that\u2019s what I get to do a lot of the time. Because of the relative success of the project, I can afford to do that and take time. That\u2019s a big factor in this industry now: How do you afford to take the time to develop a piece of work? Because everyone is pushing you to put something out. The game is content, content, content, so things are really rushed.<\/p>\n \n\tSo this was a year or so of making music while I was touring and running around and producing other people\u2019s records, then maybe six months of being very focused on this album. Obviously I\u2019m still traveling and playing at the same time. So maybe three days a week I can do that\u2026 And now I\u2019m working on the next one, apologizing for this one. [Laughs<\/em>.]<\/p>\n \n\tWhat do you think you have to say \u201csorry\u201d for now?<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tI don\u2019t know if I should say, but I think it could be cooler. My big revelation about my creative process over the last two weeks is that I have an inner contrarian against my own taste\u2026 There is a part of me that goes [gestures towards water glass<\/em>] \u201cThat glass is absolutely perfect. It\u2019s beautiful. That\u2019s exactly how we like a glass.\u201d Then this other part of me goes, \u201cYeah, but you can\u2019t just do what you like like. Let\u2019s f\u2013k it up a bit. Let\u2019s ruin it 15%\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tI think that\u2019s probably what I\u2019m going to be thinking about \u2014\u00a0can I actually make a record that\u2019s entirely to my taste, without letting contrarian saboteur<\/em> come in and spoil the elements?<\/p>\n \n\tSo you\u2019ve been able to identify this voice as a saboteur, versus someone who\u2019s like, nudging you in a particular creative direction?<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tIt\u2019s a saboteur. It\u2019s bad.<\/p>\n \n\tThat\u2019s great to know, because we all have so many voices in our heads that it can be hard to ascertain what\u2019s true. <\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tI\u2019ve had a Greek chorus of critics for a long time. You know, my enemies. They\u2019re up there, and they\u2019re like, \u201cHaha, this is s\u2013t. You\u2019re an idiot.\u201d I think everyone has that. This one is much closer to me. This is very personal. When I was a kid, my friends would say I was a contrarian, and I think this is where that\u2019s ended up.<\/p>\n \n\tI can see how it could be confusing, because the idea it\u2019s giving you isn\u2019t necessarily bad.<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tYeah, it\u2019s like, \u201cIf it sounds a bit s\u2013t, maybe that\u2019s how it should sound\u201d. And it\u2019s like, \u201cWell, actually, I have a big intellectual, technical part of me that knows I can make that sound better, even closer to perfect.\u201d I\u2019m always trying to get somewhere near that thing. I know how to do that, and I know what it is. Then the saboteur, the contrarian, goes, \u201cNah, f\u2013k it. F\u2013k it. F\u2013k it!!\u201d <\/p>\n \n\tKind of like a nihilist.<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tTotally. It\u2019s a defense thing. Like, \u201cTotally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs.\u201d That was a defense.<\/p>\n \n\tRight, so you\u2019ve officially changed your name to TEED. I read in an interview from awhile ago that you chose that first name in an attempt to be outside trends. But it sounds like maybe you have a different perspective now?<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tNo, no, no. That was it, but like, what is that? What is an attempt to be outside of trends? Really, it\u2019s an attempt to not be pinned down, to have an ironic shield against the world. I\u2019m actually pretty grateful for it. I think maybe I wouldn\u2019t be here without it. If I\u2019d been an entirely self-serious artist without humor and without a little silliness, I never would have put anything out. It helps to have a thing where you\u2019re a bit like, \u201cHere\u2019s this thing I really<\/em> love, but I don\u2019t really mean it.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tSo if someone else hates it, it doesn\u2019t hurt you.<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tYeah, less so. It\u2019s less harmful. But also, on the trends and the what\u2019s cool\/what\u2019s not cool thing, it was nice not to really be part of that, because that\u2019s such a silly, fickle world, and it\u2019s run by about 100 people. I don\u2019t want to give them the keys to my career. And actually, that worked really well. A lot of people just completely ignored me. They didn\u2019t say good things or bad things about me, and that was nice, but I found my audience anyway.<\/p>\n \n\tSo along with the maturity, I think, comes the feeling that times have changed. Having an ironic outward brand no longer works, because people don\u2019t spend more than half a second assessing your outer brand, as it were\u2026 I think within the music and within me, there\u2019s still humor and subversion, but on the surface of it, it\u2019s just TEED, so think whatever you like. It doesn\u2019t mean anything.<\/p>\n \n\tAlso Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs is a mouthful. Did you ever run into difficulty of it just being like, a lot to get out?<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tRadio DJs hated it. But actually most of all, I feel bad for fans, because, phonetically it\u2019s horrible to say. As it comes out of your mouth, it is a nasty experience. People who are like, out there telling their friends about my music and that they love it, and I\u2019m putting them through this thing of them wanting to feel cool, telling their friends about cool music, but then I make them say this insanely uncool thing, which\u2026 I feel bad about that. So, sorry about that.<\/p>\n \n\tApologizing still!<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tAlways.<\/p>\n \n\tYou worked on the last SG Lewis album and his Heat <\/em>EP with Tove Lo, which makes sense as there\u2019s a lot of connective tissue between those projects and your new album. What sonic world do you think you guys are inhabiting? <\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tA lot of people I work with, myself included, I think we\u2019re all trying to do a very similar thing, which is try and merge the body, the physicality of electronic music, with songwriting and the emotional depth of songwriting. Obviously some people have managed to do it very well over the last 40 years. Depeche Mode, or Michael Jackson, or lots of the \u201980s U.K. synth wave people. Then you have classic house records from the \u201990s and 2000s that really sit in that place where there\u2019s a great song with great lyrics and you can ignite a dance<\/a> floor. I think there\u2019s certainly an itch there that loads of us are trying to scratch and figure it out. I still haven\u2019t managed to do it.<\/p>\n \n\tDo you think you\u2019re getting close?<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tI don\u2019t know. I enjoy the journey, because then I end up with completely different things and it\u2019s fine\u2026 It\u2019s a kind of timeless problem to be staring at.<\/p>\n