Life has been both hectic and incredibly fruitful for Toronto rap foursome Notes To Self since they dropped their debut full-length five years ago. Their tireless approach to brand development through extensive touring, the launch of a nostalgia-rooted merch line, and increasingly creative music videos has earned them the strong support of fans and, more recently, new home Decon Records. Their new album, Target Market [Recoil], is an evolution from an initially free hold-over collection into a proper sophomore album.
Despite going into this release with the idea that it would only be a free promotional piece, it sounds like you were able to really change directions and come up with a linear record.
Bronze One: The material that ended up on the album came together in a fairly short period of time, and even though it did take us quite a while to put it out, we kind of went with our guts. Especially with a lot of the growth that not only myself and my co-producer Book did on the record, but also in our rap game. With "All Of The Above," for instance, that was something that started out as something Roshin and I were working on that we just really felt good about, and we instantly had a very clear vision as to what we wanted to do with the song. Once Roshin picked up on what he wanted topic-wise, he shared some of his raps with Swamp, and Swamp immediately just knocked it out. That whole process really made an impression early on while we were putting together songs in making that cohesive, and because it all came together so quickly, it felt really good!
Where does the title, Target Market [Recoil], come from?
Swamp Donkey: The idea of Target Market was a bit of a play on having a very pointed album with a purpose towards a certain demographic. We were taking it more from the "shot in the dark" of the original album, and this time we were trying to not be so specific, like we're just trying to sell this album to this generation. We were trying to kind of hit something and do something that was really impressive, and put out something bigger that hit the mark for us.
Despite going into this release with the idea that it would only be a free promotional piece, it sounds like you were able to really change directions and come up with a linear record.
Bronze One: The material that ended up on the album came together in a fairly short period of time, and even though it did take us quite a while to put it out, we kind of went with our guts. Especially with a lot of the growth that not only myself and my co-producer Book did on the record, but also in our rap game. With "All Of The Above," for instance, that was something that started out as something Roshin and I were working on that we just really felt good about, and we instantly had a very clear vision as to what we wanted to do with the song. Once Roshin picked up on what he wanted topic-wise, he shared some of his raps with Swamp, and Swamp immediately just knocked it out. That whole process really made an impression early on while we were putting together songs in making that cohesive, and because it all came together so quickly, it felt really good!
Where does the title, Target Market [Recoil], come from?
Swamp Donkey: The idea of Target Market was a bit of a play on having a very pointed album with a purpose towards a certain demographic. We were taking it more from the "shot in the dark" of the original album, and this time we were trying to not be so specific, like we're just trying to sell this album to this generation. We were trying to kind of hit something and do something that was really impressive, and put out something bigger that hit the mark for us.