Buzzworthiness, thy name is Chaz BundickAfter parting with his punk act the Heist and the Accomplice, Bundick made his side project Toro Y Moi his main focus and is now abuzz on the blogs and releasing two albums in 2010. This Sunday, the ever-relaxed Bundick will be visiting the Duke Coffeehouse with headline-making acts Islands (formerly the Unicorns) and ex-Be Your Own Pet member Jemina Pearl. While in August, Bundick took some time to talk about the tour and his project.
How’s the tour going?
It’s good. Everyone is really cool in the other bands. I was kind of worried that I wasn’t going to get along with anybody because it’s so random, but everyone is really good.
Were you around for the recently newsworthy Jemina Pearl incident?
Oh, where she punched some guy? No, was that recently? I heard about last week, but it wasn’t sure if it was recent. She’s pretty cool. She’s not mean or anything. I heard the reason she punched that guy was because he was like requesting songs from her old band and being a total asshole.
To focus on your music, what can you tell me about your planned release for next year?
The first one is going to be a little bit more electronic-based—kind of spacey, echo-y, all that stuff. The second one is going to be songwriter-type traditional songs. It’s going to be like guitars and drums, not a lot of electronic stuff.
How did you transition from your Heist and the Accomplice work into Toro Y Moi?
Even during the Heist and the Accomplice, I was into that kind of stuff. I just wasn’t using the Heist as the output for those types of songs. I had like a lot of earlier stuff that was electronic too but a little bit more weird than the Heist. I used to write just acoustic songs and then I got away from it, but now I try to maintain both sides of it.
How are you doing these Toro Y Moi tracks live?
I pretty much have the songs running from a program, and I’m doing live vocals and keyboard.
Why are you doing two albums in one year, especially since this is your debut?
It was an option. I had all this material I was working on, and I have a few sides to what I’m trying to do with Toro Y Moi, so I wanted to show those. I wanted to show more the more rock-indie-folk-type thing, and I wanted to show the experimental pop-type.
Do you think anything has changed for you since signing to Car Park other than the increase in attention?
I don’t think so. I definitely see more opportunities now. That might change the way I write songs because I’m more busy. The outside things are going to effect the way I’m working, you know? I’m going to have to stay in touch with what I was trying to do. I don’t want it to change the way I’m writing songs. I don’t want touring too much to make want to write songs faster before I go out on the road again.
Can you tell me about some of the remixes you’re working on right now?
I’ve got a couple. I’m doing one for Neon Indian that’s slowly coming along. I’m collaborating with another artist called CSCS, he’s from CSCS. I’ve got those in the works. And I have a project called Les Sin so I have a bunch of people doing remixes for that album. I don’t know when that’s coming out yet. Sometime in the spring, I think.
Is anything else happening with Les Sin?
No, not really. It’s all going to go under Toro Y Moi. We decided to keep it all under one name to make things easier.
Toro Y Moi will open for Jemina Pearl and Islands Sunday, Nov. 1 at the Duke Coffeehouse. The show starts at 9 p.m. and tickets are $10, free for Duke students.
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