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Tempe, Arizona is scorching hot, and trying to hide from the sun feels impossible.

Luckily, there’s a shady spot beside a few artist trailers behind Inning’s Festival’s Right Field stage to wait for Oklahoma-raised pop-punk darlings All-American Rejects to come chat before their set. There’s been lots of focus on nostalgia during the two-day fest that takes place during Major League Baseball’s spring training. The line-up is a who’s who of early aughts hitmakers like The Killers and Fall Out Boy. Attendees are all dressed in their favorite team’s jersey or a band tee that could be considered vintage, even though they likely bought it new.

In fact, the obsession with looking back starts before we even step foot on the festival grounds. The night before, All-American Rejects invites fans to Phoenix’s Carry On, a retro plane-themed bar with seats that vibrate and flight attendants who serve cocktails as visuals of clouds play across realistic windows (later the band jokes if “you could get the staff to sign an NDA, you can really do some fun stuff in there”).

At one point — ignoring the seatbelt sign — front-man Tyson Ritter stops by our seats and a guest briefs him on just how impactful the band’s first album, their self-titled 2002 release, meant to them. It’s the same sentiment you can feel and hear as they take the stage during the festival — with the crowd screaming back the words of “Move Along,” “Swing Swing,” and “Dirty Little Secret.”

The band — comprised of Ritter, lead guitarist and backing vocalist Nick Wheeler, rhythm guitarist and backing vocalist Mike Kennerty, and drummer Chris Gaylor — just started touring again last year for the first time in over a decade. Dressed in their Baseball Uniform, with the word “Rejects” emblazoned in red and black across their chest, you’d think they’d never stopped. Sure, it’s been years and everything is different, but for one weekend in Tempe, it felt like nothing had changed.

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One of the conversations we were having last night [at Carry On] was about how so many of us burned your debut album on Napster. I want to take this time to admit that … and to apologize.

Tyson Ritter: We know how it goes, we don’t make money off records.

Were you aware that a lot of people were getting into your music that way?

Nick Wheeler: I think so. I mean, senior year of highschool, which would of been around ’99 or 2000 I got Napster I was ripping music. The way young people now are finding music on Spotify, that’s how we were finding music back then. It was part of our culture. Of course, kids are gonna put us on burnt CDs. That’s what we did, so it’s an honor. Will probably find them at some point, break their legs or something. [Laughs]

If you find them… Let’s fast forward to now. The most recent music you released was a cover of [Harvey Danger’s 1997 hit] “Flagpole Sitta.”

Nick: I probably ripped that on Napster.

We all did. Why did you want to release that song?

Tyson: Why not? But also we needed an excuse to see if we could do the studio thing together. We haven’t put [out music] when it comes to All-American Rejects in over a decade and that’s scary. We grew up in front of the record button since I was 15 and Nick was 17. We all recorded music in our early teens. You know… you’re a writer, what did you write when you were 17?

Things I don’t want to talk about.

Ritter: See? You change. Then, there was this wide [span of time] since our last record [2012’s Kids In The Street], which wasn’t exactly a label success, but it was an expressive success for us. There was a moment when we were [touring] in Mobile, Alabama and I was like, “We can’t fucking do this anymore.” I’m good at saying the things that Nick doesn’t express.

Wheeler: Yeah. Maybe we’re thinking the same thing, he’s always the first one to say it.

Ritter: We’ve always been a hive mind. The four of us have been together for this massive chunk of time. You need time to take a break to see if you care about it the same way and if it’s the same thing to you. There are a lot of our contemporaries who have walked into making it an enterprise as opposed to making it art. I know it sounds funny. I’m the guy who wrote the lyrics to “Dirty Little Secret.” So, people don’t consider us an art form, but I’m an older guy, and Nick and I have locked back into the room of writing, going, “If it’s gonna be different, it’s probably not gonna be comfortable.”

Getting to where we are today of putting [music] down, which is what we’re doing, has taken a lot of fireside chats. A lot of mending fences. That’s exciting. I think I said in an interview, people don’t really want a new All-American Rejects record. People want their time capsule and want to jump into it and feel like they smell CK One and it makes them feel young. But the question I pose is, “What if we can say something now? What if we can actually resonate?”

Wheeler: People say they want new music from certain bands, but they don’t necessarily want stuff that sounds exactly like the stuff we already gave them and nostalgic feels… they already have that. If we’re going to do something, we’re going to do something different that hopefully resonates with them, as well as a new audience.

Can we talk about what you’re working on? I know you might not be able to tell us all the details, but what’s the process like? What’s the expectation like?

Wheeler: It’s not like riding a bike. The music part will always be part of our DNA. The thing that has been interesting to navigate has been putting out music independently. We came out before Instagram, before YouTube. Then we stepped back 10 years ago and look what happened since then. There are so many platforms we have to learn to utilize because that’s where people find music and art.

Ritter: For me, I don’t consider any of that bullshit. I’m starting this process in my own little sphere now, which is a little different to how we use to approach it. Nick and I used to sit in the same room, and our process was like cultivating in a laboratory and anything you accidentally create is pure. But when you go back in and try to put the lab coats back on and make sure all the beakers are in place, you realize you’re building a product. I had to ask, “What the fuck do I have to say now that I’m 40?” And I know your audience doesn’t care to read shit by old men, [laughs] but I think as an artist it’s like, What do you feel? I’m not singing about heartache as a teenager. I’m happily married. What’s wrong with the world? Well, fucking everything.

We’ve always been good at being a tongue bursting through the cheek to kid you into melancholic fun. We were always the black sheep in Emo because we were fun. Now there’s a song we’re writing, but it’s about a war on a playground because I think, how can we look at ourselves as humans at our ugliest? Put it through the lens of a child. That seems like the only time we care anymore or have empathy — if it’s something pure getting hurt. We’re going through big themes here. As families age, things get fucking weird and bad, so there are songs I’ve penned about my mom that are super heavy for me. I can’t look back on anything in our catalog — except the record nobody gave a shit about — and say this is coming from a really heavy place inside of me. So, bringing that to Nick and cultivating it with the band is what makes it new and keeps us stoked.

If we’re going to do something, we’re going to do something different that hopefully resonates with them, as well as a new audience.

Photography: Courtesy of C3/ Innings Festival

For nearly three years, Ghost Mountain existed only as a myth. The California-based rapper, producer and original member of Haunted Mound helped shape the horror-drenched aesthetic that launched the collective into underground stardom — only to erase his entire catalog and walk away from music in 2021.

His sudden departure left fans scrambling for answers, sparking Reddit threads that dissected lyrics, old Instagram posts, and speculated about beef between him and fellow founder Sematary. Had there been a falling out? Was it creative differences? Or had he simply disappeared into the woods?

“As one can imagine, it was confusing,” he tells PAPER in his first-ever interview. “It took a couple of years before me and Sematary really started to talk about the possibility of me making music with Haunted Mound again.” But now, the founding fathers are reunited. What started as a quiet reconciliation turned into a creative revival, leading to Ghost Mountain’s long-awaited return with his debut solo mixtape, October Country.

The tape, executive produced by Ghost Mountain and Sematary, arrives on the heels of singles “Apollon” and “Dark Harvest,” released in late 2024. It also features production from Haunted Mound’s Oscar18, who helped lay the foundation for the project before Sematary stepped in to complete it. Ghost Mountain, known for his eerie, folk-infused delivery on early Haunted Mound releases like Rainbow Bridge and Rainbow Bridge 2, reemerges with a sound that builds on his past while reaching into something entirely new.

“The idea started with the concept of returning to something that’s no longer there,” he says. “I wanted to make something that felt new but also carried that emotional weight.” Blending elements of folk, trap, and ‘80s dance, October Country explores the impossibility of fully returning to the past — a theme that resonates deeply with his own story.

For Ghost Mountain, this homecoming is about more than just music, but friendship. “I just wanted to clear the air,” he says about his reconciliation with Sematary. “In doing that, I realized that there’s actually a lot more understanding there than we each thought.” As their friendship was rebuilt, so was their creative chemistry, naturally leading to their first collaboration in years.

Now, Ghost Mountain is stepping back into the spotlight — not just with his debut, but with an upcoming Haunted Mound tour, marking his first live performances since his return. In this candid conversation, below, he opens up about his time away, Criss Angel and what the future holds for Haunted Mound.

Congrats on making your return to Haunted Mound. I know it’s a big deal. Could you talk about why now is the right time to return? How did you know you were ready, and what was it like for you over the past few years?

I went to school in — I think it was around 2020 or 2021— and at that time, Sematary and I weren’t really in communication. We weren’t really talking. It was maybe around 2022 when we ended up reconnecting, just kind of on some friendship. It took a couple of years before we actually really started to talk about the possibility of me making music with Haunted Mound again. A lot of it was just about the process of us becoming friends again, and the music part of it came naturally, as we would talk about the music that we were into. We were reconnecting on that front.

I think it was late 2023 when “Apollon” was recorded. That was probably the first song I had recorded since I left that was on a beat made by Haunted Mound. And that was the first single that ended up coming out. It was a long process. But I think what made us realize that the time was right was just how things lined up with that song and how the video came together. I feel like the video and the song were very one thing. So once that had panned out, we were like, “Okay, this is feeling right, and this makes sense.” I’d also graduated that year as well. It was a lot of things realigning.

A realignment. Yeah, I heard you went to school for videography and editing.

I went to school for film in Northern California. I wasn’t really sure exactly what it was that I wanted to do in the arts when I was in high school. And that was around when Sematary and I started making music. But I found there were a lot of connections between film and the music that I was making with Sematary at the time.

What about Northern California do you think makes Haunted Mound what it is? Since you grew up there, how did the environment influence the sound?

I think it makes up a lot of the characteristics of what Haunted Mound is. Because when you’re a kid, I would say you’re influenced the most by your environment and then, you know, the internet. I think it was a combination of things that Sematary and I were into at the time in high school that were exclusively online, and we weren’t really seeing anywhere else in the place that we were growing up, or even in what people were into in the town that we were growing up in as well.

It was a combination of taking these things that we were inspired by online exclusively and then doing what we could with that in the environment that we were in. I can’t really speak for him, but at least for me, I’m inspired a lot by the environment that I’m in. And so kind of mythologizing the area that you’re growing up in and filling in some of the gaps that feel empty with the stuff that you’re into. Your imagination fills in those gaps. But a lot of it was from him. A lot of the influences online and everything that Sematary was into and he was pushing. I was finding things that I connected with in his vision and then building off of that. That was definitely how our collaboration started.

What was your creative dynamic like back then? Were you both pulling influences from the internet, or was there a division of roles?

It was pretty much entirely him, other than the lyrics that I would write and record. It started with his vision for combining the influences he was into at the time. I remember him sending me beats in early 2019 — it was like nothing I had heard before. He combined a lot of our influences in a way that was super unique and exciting to me. He told me, “You should get on this,” and I was really into underground rap at the time, like GothBoiClique, Corbin and Wicca Phase. They always used a lot of imagery in their lyrics, more so than other artists in the genre, and I think I took that approach and applied it to what I was writing over Sematary’s beats.

I didn’t put much of myself into the early music other than writing and recording. The overall production, the general concept of the tapes — those were all him. I’m pretty sure he had at least the first three or four mixtapes fully planned out before even making them. This new project is actually the first time I’ve been involved in the production and shaping of an album beyond just writing lyrics.

When you left in 2021, were you aware of all the internet speculation and Reddit discussions about it? Haunted Mound really blew up during that time. What was it like watching that unfold from a distance, and what was the catalyst that made you want to reconcile with Sematary?

As one can imagine, it was confusing. I think the catalyst of it was realizing that there was a general lack of communication between me and Sematary. Realizing that the inability to communicate was pretty much what led to us not talking anymore. Even when I was in college, the experience of being a roommate with a friend of yours and how difficult that communication can be and how that can build up resentment and lead to trouble — it was even harder when Sematary and I were 18, 19 years old. Experiencing all the changes that come with internet fame, for lack of a better word, or how all the things were happening so fast… realizing that there was a lack of communication that led to us being estranged. I just wanted to clear the air. In doing that, I realized that there’s actually a lot more understanding there than we each thought. It wasn’t my intention to necessarily go back to making music under the name Ghost Mountain when we initially reconnected. It was just about repairing that relationship and getting on the same page about how things went down.

I heard October Country blends folk, trap and even ’80s dance elements. How did the sound for this project come together?

The idea started with the concept of returning to something that’s no longer there. Nostalgia, essentially. I built a playlist of influences — songs that didn’t necessarily have nostalgic lyrics but sounded nostalgic. And then combining real things with the narratives or mythology that Haunted Mound was initially built on. It wasn’t like I was necessarily writing about the real events in my life when I was a teenager. It can be difficult once you’re older to make art that’s entirely escapism. I wanted to make something that felt new, but also carried that emotional weight. The ’80s influence comes from my parents — what they played when I was a kid. Blending that with what I listened to in high school and middle school shaped the sound of the project.

Are there any surprising influences that shaped Haunted Mound early on or even influenced this new album?

I didn’t really think about it until you mentioned it, but I was super into Criss Angel when I was younger — kind of like the emo David Blaine. Also, there’s this band Ryan Gosling started in the early 2000s called Dead Man’s Bones. I found them through some horror movie promo, and it really captured the nostalgia of Halloween and fall in a way I hadn’t seen before. Are you asking about my early influences or for this new project?

I guess for both. The early iconography of Haunted Mound and the newness of your new album.

I was pulling from Dead Man’s Bones for this new project. But for the early stuff, it was just the movies that we were into. It was really a blend of things that Sematary was into and things that I was into. I’ll occasionally go back and listen to the old music, and the amount of references we packed into the lyrics is crazy to me now because they really run the gamut. I think David Lynch was a big one.

When you said Criss Angel, everything clicked for me. I was obsessed with him.

Same. That was when I was maybe 10 or 11. I wasn’t ever necessarily pulling from Criss Angel consciously, but maybe subconsciously a lot of that was there.

I really believed that he was levitating. I still do.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, how else could he have done it? Didn’t he lift Shaq over a house or something? I think that was his best work.

What do you hope for the future of Haunted Mound? What’s next after October Country?

I think it’s important to not focus too hard on expectations, which is something that I had to learn considering that this is a weird case where there are a lot of expectations. Oscar18 was heavily involved in this album. He created the seeds for it. It was Oscar and I making a lot of the early demos, and then Sematary came in and finished the album for me. I think for fan expectations, it’s gonna be interesting to see what people think of the sound because it’s pretty different from anything that’s come out of Haunted Mound up until this point. For the most part, it’s pretty out there.

For the future, immediately there’s the first Haunted Mound tour coming up that I’ll be involved with. There’s Europe in late spring/early summer, and then the US leg will be after that, which is super exciting. It’ll be interesting to see those songs being played live. Bringing back the old music, that’s also coming up. I guess for Ghost Mountain, this last project was obviously focused on the fall season. I’m pretty interested in applying mythology and narratives to real life. I was doing a lot of that in the songwriting for the album. I have this loose idea to make projects based on the seasons and the feelings that specific seasons give me. Winter is the next one after this. That one will be leaning a little more toward stuff that people are familiar with coming from Haunted Mound.

I love October. It’s probably my favorite month.

Yeah. Fall is always a super nostalgic time. There are a lot of changes happening. It’s not necessarily the end of the year, but it’s the sign of the year coming to an end.

What’s your favorite scary movie?

It Follows. I think that still reigns supreme.

Wow. That’s literally my favorite, too.

Either that or there’s this movie called Angst that I haven’t seen since I first watched it five years ago. That one I’ll never forget. It’s Polish or something.

Thanks so much for hopping on this interview.

Of course, thank you!

I think it’s important to not focus too hard on expectations.

Photography and styling: Eternity Chaos

On Sunday, Lacoste presented its Fall 2025 collection on the Philippe-Chatrier tennis court at the Roland-Garros stadium, as Creative Director Pelagia Kolotouros found inspiration in the brand’s tennis heritage and Founder René Lacoste’s life as both a tennis champion and socialite. In the ’30s, Lacoste mixed with all sorts of cultural shapers — actors, athletes and fashion icons of the day.

Much like then, the Lacoste show brought together stars like Venus Williams, Adrien Brody, and South Korean pop artist and former Now United member HEYOON. For her first fashion week last season, HEYOON wore a dainty sheer mint dress to attend the Lacoste Spring 2025 show. This season, she edged things up: a black button-down dress with a sheer overlay and knee-high leather boots as she partied with famous friends for the afterparty.

Below, HEYOON brings PAPER through the night, from getting ready at her hotel to dancing with guests like Stromae.

Glam tonight.

But first coffee?

Head-to-toe Lacoste for tonight.

The finished look.

Good to see you again, Pelagia. You are such an inspiration.

If you can’t find me, I am probably on the dance floor.

With Stromae.

With the talented Adrien Brody.

Look who I ran into: Hanan Besovic (AKA @ideservecouture).

Thank you for having me, Lacoste. I’ll be dancing the rest of the night.

Photos courtesy of HEYOON

Haley Reinhart was always a bit ahead of her time. The 34-year-old retro soul singer has had an interesting career, which started when she finished in third on the 2011 season of American Idol. Since then, she’s carved out her own distinct lane in the music industry as someone who blends raw soul with a futuristic approach to old-time sounds.

Take her upcoming yet-to-be-released single, “Danger,” for example. “I feel like it captures all the things that make me the artist that I am,” she tells PAPER. The slinky keys and gritty, sexy vocal delivery the singer has become known for encapsulate a sound and feel that is long gone. Yet it’s Reinhart in her purest form.

Reinhart’s journey has been anything but conventional, sidestepping industry expectations to build a career that feels both timeless and distinctly her own. Her voice — a raspy, hypnotic blend of vintage jazz and blues with modern polish — has remained her guiding force. Whether it’s through cinematic syncs that have left a lasting emotional impact (“Can’t Help Falling in Love” in that 2015 Extra Gum commercial) or sultry reimaginings of classics with Postmodern Jukebox, she has maintained a presence that transcends viral moments.

Now, fresh off an East Coast tour, Reinhart is gearing up for her next chapter: a new album that promises to lean even further into the grit and soul she’s become known for. After her headlining show at NYC’s Sony Hall, PAPER caught up with Reinhart to talk about navigating the music industry on her own terms, the weight of authenticity and how she’s still proving that a reality show start doesn’t define an artist’s future.

Congrats on wrapping up your tour! Are you exhausted, or do you feel like you could keep going?

I think it’s a feeling of both. I’m ready to get back in the studio now, but I’m feeling very fulfilled. The last couple of years were over 100 shows each year, and I feel good — just a little tired.

Do you experience that post-tour adrenaline crash?

I like to take a couple of days to chill, but there’s always something coming up, which is great. If I had nothing happening, I’d probably miss it right away. After this last show, I definitely felt a weight lifted because I knew I was about to shift into writing mode again. But I also realized I had built up stamina, and I could keep going. It was a good feeling to not be completely burned out.

I was at your Sony Hall show, and the crowd was so diverse. How would you describe your audience these days?

It’s always so varied, which I love. There are older gentlemen who are really passionate about music, younger couples and a lot of my gays. It reflects my sound — I’ve never wanted to be boxed into one genre and I think that’s why my audience is so diverse.

Looking back, how do you feel about American Idol and its role in your career?

There are always so many thoughts that percolate when I think about it, and I guess it depends on the kind of artist you are or the one you aspire to be. But for me, I never wanted to use Idol as a crutch. I didn’t want it to be the thing that defined me forever, and I didn’t want it to be the first thing in the headline. And yet, sometimes it still is. That said, I love to talk about it and I love going back to be a mentor. It gave me such a huge platform, and I’m so grateful for the experience. But at the same time, I was immediately thinking, How do I set myself apart? How do I create opportunities that feel authentic and not corny after the show? So I had to knock on a lot of doors to feel like I could do things like Lollapalooza and be on the ACL headlining stage. There were people at the time who would shun contestants from shows like Idol and I had to work that much harder to prove myself. Now, I think it’s actually cool again. People don’t care as much about where you come from. But back then, there were certain music circles where it felt like being from Idol was a double-edged sword. It helped in some ways, but in other ways I had to start from scratch like everybody else. I knew I had to create my own lane and that just made me more determined.

Did you feel like the show was manipulating you toward a specific narrative?

The feeling I had was as if I was at a party that I was initially invited to, but they wanted me to leave early. And, you know, I like to be the one that leaves a party last — in all ways. So I just went into survival mode because I had to, really, at a younger age, make this connection and realize that, They’re gonna do some sabotaging, they’re gonna do some things to make great TV. And they loved [me] off-camera — judges, producers, all of them. I don’t mean that in a cocky way, I just knew they genuinely liked me. And that made it even more unsettling at times, because then I’d be like, Why would you say something totally different about me on-camera to millions of people? It was part of the show and I had to accept that, but it was tough. I just felt so gaslit looking back. I had to really go inward. I felt like I was constantly in fight-or-flight mode. Looking back, I realize I’ve blocked out a lot of that time. I don’t like to throw around the word trauma, but I definitely have gaps in my memory from how intense that whole experience was. We were working nonstop, from morning until night, and the audience only saw a fraction of it. The press, the signings, the commercials — it was just constant. It was a lot to take in at 19, 20 years old.

After Idol, you signed with Interscope. What was that experience like?

I wasn’t happy there anymore. Lana Del Rey had just come into the label and, suddenly, everything else took a back seat. There was a new president and they let go of over 50 acts. I was proud of Listen Up!, but I wanted to put out a horn-driven single with B.o.B. that ended up being ahead of its time. They wanted me to do a ballad instead, which just wasn’t in my heart.

That’s true. In the years after that, horns in pop songs became such a thing for a moment there.

There was “Talk Dirty,” and then Ariana [Grande] came out with something with the horns too. I remember being like, God, why didn’t you [release that]? I always felt like I was a little bit ahead of the curve, to be honest, with labels specifically. I was just like, This is kind of obvious guys, You know? Sorry I don’t have a bunch of money to throw at you so that you can do your job. I was defiant, even at a young age. I told Jimmy Iovine I didn’t want to release an album I didn’t write. We had some words, but they let me do it and a lot of people in that position would have just been shelved. Eventually, when they let a bunch of people go, I was included, and I wasn’t mad about it.

You had Lady Gaga as a mentor on Idol and performed “You and I” before it was even released. That performance got some backlash. What was that experience like?

That wasn’t even my song choice! They suggested it to me and I didn’t know it was an unreleased Gaga song at the time. The wildest part is they didn’t show the best moment — Gaga and I jamming backstage while she was teaching me the song. That was the coolest part and it never made it to air. It was frustrating because off-camera, I felt a lot of love from the judges and producers, but on-camera, they’d say something totally different. It was a huge lesson in realizing how much of the show is about making great TV. They were trying to create moments, manipulate things and I just had to navigate it. The whole experience was surreal. I remember performing with Tony Bennett at the finale, and Gaga was there watching. Later, she and Tony ended up collaborating, and I was like, Wow, I got to be part of that timeline somehow. I just wish more of those raw, behind-the-scenes moments had been shown. So much great footage probably exists somewhere in a vault — me and Gaga at the piano, just vibing. I’d love to see it one day.

You played a new song, “Danger,” at your show. Is that gonna be the vibe for your new album?

I’m really excited for “Danger.” That’s what I want to push first. I have a scratch demo of it, but I want to build on that and get it out really soon. I want “Danger” to be the catalyst for this next record. I might even name it Danger, but I’m not sure yet. I feel like it captures all the things that make me the artist that I am. It has flavors of vintage, but it’s also edgier and that’s what I want to lean into. I want to show the grit in my voice, the slinkiness and the soul, but still keep it classy. I’m just excited to take that song, finish it and put it out there. Then I’ll let that inspire the rest of the album.

What’s inspiring you these days?

I really want to find balance. My life has been all about work and touring, and I’d love to travel just for the sake of it, not just for shows. I’ve never really had that experience. I also want to explore more acting opportunities — I loved doing F is for Family with Bill Burr, and I’d love to do more voice work or even some on-screen roles. And, of course, I’m excited to dive into writing this next album.

You’ve taken a very independent approach to your career. Has that been intentional?

Absolutely. I’ve said no to more things than I’ve said yes to because I trust my intuition. People think Idol is a fast track, but it’s just the beginning. You still have to do the work, find your own opportunities and make sure you’re making decisions that feel right. I’ve turned down deals that didn’t align with what I wanted, and even though it might have taken longer I feel like I’ve built something that’s truly mine.

I remember when your version of “Can’t Help Falling in Love” went viral in that Extra Gum commercial in 2015. I feel like stuff doesn’t go viral like that anymore, even. The internet is too oversaturated and fast-paced.

Right. There could be like an AI voice on the commercial now and you’ll never know. I mean, sync was such my bread and butter for so long. And that commercial now, I’ll have people that I don’t even know tell me that they’re in the ad world or have some seemingly unrelated occupation, but they play this commercial to teach people how to create ads. I would have never known that. That’s pretty fucking cool. It was just a lightning-in-a-bottle situation.

You seem to have this balance of being ahead of the curve but also deeply rooted in vintage sounds. How do you view your place in music?

That’s exactly what I want — to blend the past and the future in a way that feels authentic. I’m just continuing on this path of intention and authenticity, and we’ll see where it leads.

I always felt like I was a little bit ahead of the curve.

Photography: Jimmy Giambrone