YHHF! Vol. 3: TOVA has something to say

+ up-and-comers need to work on their narrative

You must learn: way to self-mythologise 

What connects Wizkid’s relentless rise from inner-city ghetto kid to cultural icon to Burna Boy’s “belated” fulfillment of destiny years after being recognised as one of the most naturally-gifted talents of his generation? If you ask me, I’d say guided narrative! Narrative to further burnish their artistic grandeur.

The stringing together of random, disparate events into a cohesive piece of storytelling that puts a human pulse to the success story of any artist can not, should not, be overlooked.  

In the all-encompassing journey of being an up-and-coming musician, there’s a lot you have to pay mind. The music, it’s promotion, and even the seemingly mundane necessity of ensuring your head’s in the right place can drain your attention. Also, the grind of just putting yourself out there can blindside you to the importance of tracking your career for those little tidbits that make up what your career arc has been about all the while. It is important not to let those moments fade into the galaxy without any way of immortalising them or preserving their essence for future curation.

Basically, what I’m saying, in essence, is that even rising musicians have to provide an addendum of storytelling to their music content if they wish to stand out in our present world.

And it doesn’t have to be elaborate, it starts with the way music is disseminated, information can be padded on to press releases to help music writers form a surefooted opinion of you that can then seep into how great a simple music release announcement can read. Let someone, preferably close to you, write about you and the circumstance of how the music you’re putting out came to be; streamline bits of that information into press releases; add other parts to a homemade video that can live on your YouTube! In all that you do, let there be a connective thread that goes beyond just bland socials and announcement link. Start your own myth.

Big Talk: TOVA has something to say

Beyond all the subjugation of music into genres and sonic forms that often do not capture the essence of its existence, there are, perhaps, two important frameworks for understanding music at its most elemental: there is music that belongs to the people by being, with the artist merely a conveyor of the message; and there’s music that is a natural product of inner monologues and therapeutic sessions by creators that triggers intense feelings from which the audience extracts their separate meanings upon listening. TOVA’s music—one song for now!—is in the latter camp.

“Fleeting,” released in May 2020 and featuring Tami, is the first-ever song from the 22-year-old Saskatchewan-based audiophile. And although this is the first time we are hearing from him, he has always been involved in the process of creating music: writing and producing for friends before taking a plunge himself. But, now, he’s ready. “I chose now to go into music because it was the culmination of everything I’d been working on over the last couple of years,” he says in between voice messages on WhatsApp.  

In speaking, TOVA’s light-baritone voice is profound, wise even, and his words are considered. It mirrors the studiousness that is palpable all over “Fleeting,” originally part of a collection of five songs. Wielding artistic control over weighty emotional matters with sobered clarity, TOVA’s acuity shines through in sync with Tami and it’s not hard to tell that his music is an extension of intense self-introspection.

Our conversation, lightly edited for context and clarity, follows below.

You recently released your debut single, “Fleeting,” why was it the right time to go into dropping music?

I chose now to go into music because it was the culmination of everything I’d been working on over the last couple of years. I’ve been actively involved in helping my friends make their records. Be it writing, production, and all that stuff. And I felt that I was ready, personally, to start working on my stuff. I was satisfied with how far I had progressed, the way I write the things that I write, the way I compose music, and I was satisfied that I had a sound that I liked to listen to; and I felt that people might enjoy the kind of music I was hoping to create as well.

What was the learning curve like getting to a place where you felt confident enough to drop your music?

The best way to describe my learning curve is as a continuous thing. I’m always trying to improve on the thing I know how to do. It’s a constant journey of self-improvement; if I was to compare the stuff I was doing in 2018 to now, it’s worlds apart and dramatically different. I find that as I make more music and listen to more music, the more refined my taste becomes, the more convinced I am about the thing I want to do and how I want to do them. It’s exponential almost…you just get significantly better in a shorter period of time, that’ been the experience for me.

Does all the time you spent around music doing other things make your process a practice in seeking perfection?

My friends know that I am notorious for not putting out stuff, not moving unto another record until what I’m doing is sounding exactly like I want it to. For example, we wrote “Fleeting” in 2018 and recorded it in 2019 and we just continued to twinkle with it until we felt it was what it needed to be; that took a year to happen. Yes, it (my process) is almost a search for perfection but with that comes the innate acceptance that perfection, sometimes, is not always possible to attain. It just has to be perfect enough for what the original vision was; sometimes, the vision changes. As you grow and develop more, sometime, it might change a little bit. But every day in the studio or having a writing session, it’s “how can I make the craft better today than it was yesterday.”

How did “Fleeting” happen?

So, “Fleeting” was originally part of a five-song collection. Looking at what was supposed to be a body of work, I decided that we needed something that sounded somewhat happy. I was hanging out with my friend and just playing around on the piano for a bit. I liked the melody and I started humming to it, my friend was discussing something about going out in the night and we just started with the melody and the hook and I just decided to run with it. It was fun, different from the kind of stuff that I’d normally do and that’s how the song became what it is. Working with the producer, we spent a lot of time crafting the instrumental for that until we were certain that he had captured the vibe that we wanted people to experience with the record.

You said “Fleeting” is not the typical melody you’d work on, is there a typical TOVA melody or sound range?

It’s hard to describe. But hopefully, we’d be publishing soon, in the coming weeks. And with the way we’ve decided to roll-out the new music, it’ going to be that with each song, we get closer and closer to what the ideal representation of what my sound will be. I’m hoping that with each record people would be able to, more closely, decipher what and whom my influences are. I grew up listening to a lot of Black Gospel for a large part of my life. Then I discovered music that made me actually want to think and learn about music: I listened to a lot of Daniel Caesar, Frank Ocean, and John Legend. In some ways, my musical palette and the kind of music that I’d make have been very strongly inspired by the people I’d listen to. When I’m on the keyboard or in the studio making my stuff, that’s a reflection of what I’ve listened to and it’s hard now to put into words what a typical TOVA melody is or what a typical TOVA record would sound like…because “Fleeting” is in fact a TOVA record, it’s just the starting point, not the final destination. The final destination is vastly different from what “Fleeting” is, for people to appreciate the final destination, they need to know that “Fleeting” is where it started.

With regards to “Fleeting,” it felt so immersive, is there a method to writing like that?

When I’m writing a song or anything, my primary objective is to tell the most interesting story possible and every line or gimmick or whatever it is that is part of the record has to lend itself to the story. And if it’s not contributing anything to the story or taking anything away from the story, we have to take it out. I suppose a story-focused style of writing is something that I have picked up from the music I listen to a lot. Everything is there intentionally, it is there to contribute to the picture that the artist is trying to paint. When people are listening to my music, I want them to come away with a picture, to come away with an understanding of the kind of story I’m trying to tell them. Maybe that is the method to that type of writing but I try not to focus too much on the mechanics of how we arrive at the final story because the writing style in and of itself is not the end-all, the end-all is making people feel the things that I want them to feel; so, I focus on achieving that feeling first and then trying and translate it to other people is how to achieve the immersive style of writing that you speak of.

Does your Nigerian heritage have any bearing on your identity and how you create?

I like to believe that coming from where I come from does have an influence and some bearing on my identity and how I write. So far, in all the music I’ve actually done, I’ve not had an opportunity to display that but I’m hoping that sometime in the future I would be in the space and on the perfect song to talk about my experiences growing up. The place where you’re from, the place where you’ve grown up, and your life experiences are an integral part of who you are and if the objective of art is to share with the general public or listeners the essence of the totality of the person, then it is expected that your primary experiences will reflect in some fashion on your art and very soon that’ll be the case.

Stream “Fleeting” here.

Heat you need to hear: DonYom's Quarantine Together

Obviously, we will never forget 2020. COVID-19 has ensured that much. Another part of our collective memory from 2020 will be the words that assumed front row in our language, the words that changed our view of the world. Prior to now, words like “lockdown,” “contact-tracing,” and “quarantine” were arcane to us but now they are things we throw around in day to day conversation.

DonYom’s single, “Quarantine Together,” crystallizes the emotions of the time. One of missing our loved ones and the depths of actions that we’d take to be with them. Over nicely-patterned drum kicks and minimalist production, the singer weaves his words into a mosaic of want and inflamed attraction.

Stream “Quarantine Together” here!