ROLE MODEL — A BOOK OF MAGAZINE

By Clara Seely-Katz

Tucker Pillsbury, a.k.a., Role Model, is many things according to his music and his fans — a heartbroken boy, a boy in love, a boy alone, a rising star, a singer swooned over by his diverse collection of listeners. He is an artist who not only seems to embrace the imperfections of himself and the world around him but thrives in that rugged and worn space. Although relatively new to the soft pop scene, Role Model has had an incredibly successful past year, releasing new hits while his fanbase progressively increases. He has caught the eyes, ears, and hearts of the Gen-Z audience.

His show at the El Rey theater in Los Angeles was alive with energy, and his audience was packed full of "cool kids," all decked out in Y2K clothes and Role Model merchandise. From his audience alone, it was easy to tell how much of a connection he has fostered with his listeners. Many boys and girls held roses and signs, hoping for an opportunity to have their role model notice them. When he finally took the stage, a ripple of energy rushed through the crowd, everyone's attention turned to the young singer, he commanded the room. He donned a simple outfit for the show, let his music speak for him, and his fans who sang along to every song seemingly hung on to every word.

Role Model is the kind of songwriter that is able to take his listeners out of their own heads and worries and into his own, thus making them feel both like their struggles are normal and that they are not alone in one effective stroke. His music is a mix of pop and alternative, with a big emphasis on his poetic lyrics that seem to mix and mingle with the music itself, each bolstering and reinforcing the other. As this past year has effectively proven, predictions about life are hard to make, and nothing is set in stone -- that being said, Role Model's influence on the rising generation is powerful and undeniable. He is a sensitive singer with a lot of heart who is a whole lot of fun.

Read on to learn more about the tour, why this has been his best year yet, and what other paths Role Model had considered before taking the plunge into the music industry.

You are an artist who is very vocal about mental struggles. How have you been recently?

Honestly, I've been probably the best I've ever been over the past seven months or so, and I'm kind of hoping that it isn't related to the fact that my music career is doing better than it ever has. I know, I sound like I'm bragging, but I don't mean it that way -- I just hope that my mental health and my positive state of mind can exist outside of my success in my work. I also think I spent so much time alone over the past three years, honestly, that I've started to learn the little things that make me happy throughout the day. I've forced those things into my daily schedule. Simple dumb shit, like I hike every morning, which is very off-brand for me. I do it every morning because I figured out that it puts me in a better place for the rest of the day. So it's finding those little things that have made a huge difference.

Do you ever have periods where you are completely uninspired? What do you do when that happens?

During quarantine, I'm sure every person, whether they were musicians or not, were pretty uninspired a lot of the time. I need real-life experiences to have any sort of inspiration to write a song. And I think me and the rest of the world were probably struggling with that. But there were little things my producer and I would do, like very safely we would take writing trips just to get out of LA. And because our studios were shut down, we would go out into the desert and spend a week together, just us two, and work on music. Doing that helped spark some of my inspiration.

Is it going to nature or just leaving LA that helps?

I think it's really just leaving that bubble in any way. It all gets too much, too repetitive.

You have recently been touring. Is that something that inspires you?

It's a different city every night, and I am having all these interactions. There's definitely a lot more inspiration to be had on this tour. Also, I just like doing live shows; this tour is making me change a lot of what will be on the next project and rethink a lot of stuff. So it is giving me more inspiration than anything in the recent past.

So you like the tour?

I have good people around me. I'm very lucky. And I love it all so far. We’ll see when we get to world tours.

You definitely channel a lot of feminine energy into all of your work. Is that a conscious choice?

With everything, even fashion, I have always leaned more into my feminine side. I grew up surrounded by women, and I've always identified with my mom more than my dad. As a kid, I was always with my mom, looking for her approval, and always talking to my sister about girls rather than my brother. I'm not sure why, but I've just always found myself more comfortable around women than men. They inspire me in many ways.

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A lot of your single and EP cover art is really bloody and gore-based. Is there a reason for this? Are you trying to convey something, or is it an aesthetic choice?

I have not gone that deep analyzing whatever the fuck is going on. I love horror movies -- I watch horror movies like a crazy person. I should probably go get that analyzed about myself and see what's going on with that. Also, I make pop music, so I'm always trying to contrast that with something fucked up, so it's not all clean and cookie cutter.

Who inspires you in your music creation?

I have so many musical inspirations for all sorts of different reasons. For songwriting, I'd say Finneas. Kacey Musgraves, Phoebe Bridgers, Gracie Abrams, those people inspire me a lot in terms of all-around music. Then there are performers like The 1975, and this is very opposite, but Jack Harlow inspires me a lot. I'm a big fanboy for a lot of these people.

If things hadn't fallen into place as they have and you hadn't gotten into music, what would you be instead of a musician?

I don't know what I'd be. I mean, I was in school for film; my mind was pretty much set on directing music videos. I wanted to be in film, period. That was without question my whole life until I like stumbled across music in college. So I probably would have kept going to school and gotten into directing.

So, have you always wanted to move to LA?

Yes, its always been LA for me.

You started off experimenting and making music outside of the industry. Now that you are in Los Angeles and creating music in a studio with other professionals, do you feel differently about music creation/the process?

I was thinking about this the other day, about how blind I was to everything when I first started. I think there's something special about not knowing how to do anything when you start. I didn't know how to structure a song when I made "Arizona in the Summer." I didn't know how melodies should flow and rise in the structure of a song, and I think not knowing helped me a lot to stand out because I didn't fit into anything. Recently I was listening to the first EP that I had put out, and I realized how cool it was when I didn't know the way things are structured. It's a weird EP, but it works. I'm trying not to lose that creativity. I think when I came to LA, and I started recording in studios, and other people were doing the jobs that I used to do alone, it got scary. It felt more high-stakes. That being said, even though I work in a studio now, over the past year working on my next project, I made sure I really had a hand in everything. That's what's most important to me.

It seems like you are saying it was easier when there were no expectations.

Exactly. No one was helping. No one was sitting next to me telling me what I could and couldn't do for my first EP, which I think is super cool. That being said, working in a studio, I've learned to know what I like and what I don't like, and my producer works with me really closely and is also very aware of that, so I think it's like the same energy but better.

Where do you feel most at peace?

Outside, I think, which is unfortunate because I do not get to spend a lot of time outdoors. But yeah, going back to what we first talked about, it took a long time, and I had to spend a lot of time with myself to figure out the little things that make me the happiest. The contrast in my mood between sitting at home for hours if I can't go studio versus just going for a twenty-minute bike ride or something is crazy. It's so peaceful. I'm not on my phone. I don't have anything on me. Being outdoors in any capacity is always a real experience, which I'm trying to get more of.

How do you feel about social media, in general? Good or bad feelings?

I don't, I don't know. I mean, TikTok is off my phone. I deleted that a few months ago -- whenever I need to upload something, I just redownload it and then delete it again. I took that out of my life. It was amazing. I do go on Twitter here and there. Luckily, I have great followers that are super nice and fun, and we all have the same sense of humor. I just don't like being on my phone that much in general, but I love checking in on my followers and I like talking to them. I have group chats with them where I check in on them. And we've had group Zooms which were fun. I have a good relationship with my fans; I just don't have a good relationship with social media.