After years spent on the underground reggae scene and a few projects that never came to fruition, Toma releases his first album, "Identité". Openly claiming his musical diversity, he delivers a heterogeneous album, with as much reggae and dancehall as pop ballads.
Your first album has just come out. Some may have expected reggae from you, but you've been saying for a long time that that's not your intention...
Toma Yes, I never intended to make a reggae album. So I don't want to disappoint the people who are waiting for that: don't go and buy the album if you think it's all reggae. On the other hand, there is reggae in my record. Not necessarily always in the music, but in any case in the soul of everything I do. There are one or two tracks where I moved quite far away from it, especially the slightly rock ones. And yet, Blessé, which is very rock, I originally wrote on the Storm Alarm. We then decided to do an arrangement that suited me. Given the theme of the song, I wanted distortion, I needed a big beat. This album contains all the inspirations that have carried me since I was a child.
You're opening for Diam's. So you really do want to stand apart from the reggae audience?
Toma I'm as attached to it as to my life.
Mr Toma cache ne fait trois Thomas. How long have you been preparing this album?
Toma We've been working on it for two years. There are only three tracks from the old album (which never came out, editor's note) that I kept: J'attendais, Identité, and Viens. All the others are new. We did quite a lot of music before the lyrics. They are an entity that works on its own, they're called Tn'T, they work with quite a lot of people. The starting point of this story, the first sketch of the project, is really the three of us. The album was born from finding a musical identity for an artist. It works a bit like a group project but everyone is well aware that the project bears the singer's name. In every interview, I make a point of talking about them and they are there on stage as in the video. I want people to see that it works like a band. But people also need to know that I co-compose and co-produce everything, that I write all the lyrics... It's really my album.
You had album plans with Frenchie, with Bost & Bim...
Toma No, actually, Frenchie wanted to produce my record in Jamaica. But that doesn't fit with my approach. With the two Thomases, the basis of the thing is to please each other musically. When I see those guys make a demo, I'm ten times happier with their work than with most of the producers I've worked with, and I can tell you I've worked with quite a few. What am I going to do? Go and shut myself away with a guy who is surely a very good producer, but who will ask me to change my verses? Someone I won't spend all that time with, who knows me less, in a foreign country where I'll be under pressure because I'll be in front of a guy who's seen Marleys and the like go through...
The result surely wouldn't have been the same.
Toma We would certainly have made a reggae dancehall album. I don't want that.
You really sound at ease on the guitar and voice tracks.
Toma Yes. It's easy, you only hear your voice so as soon as you feel you're singing out of tune you correct yourself, it's good (laughs). I love those pop ballads.
There's a very powerful track, Identité, where you talk about your childhood.
Toma I talk about the element of my life that is important in my development: being abandoned at birth by my biological mother, and then my adoption at three months old. I was lucky not to go from children's homes to foster families, living an uncertain and difficult life. My family carried me, but for me it was hard. When you're a kid you try to find out who you are. We lived in the 77, and in my neighbourhood there were Ivorians, Malians, Algerians, Vietnamese, Japanese... In the middle of all those people who found themselves in a culture, I found myself in French culture but everyone came up to me saying I was Arab or something else. At some point, you're completely lost. And later, you understand that your identity is to be a human being. I feel like a brother to everyone and I'm far from patriotism.
The features with Joey Starr and Kery James, is that a way of paying tribute to your first loves?
Toma Absolutely. It's a source of pride for me. Joey Starr... he's the one who got me into music. The first time I discovered NTM and him especially... I was stunned by this guy that all my mates' parents hated, that mine didn't want me listening to... In an interview with Michel Denisot, on Mon Zénith à moi, he floored me. He's a rock star. He has incredible charisma.
What do you think of Winston McAnuff's work with Camille Bazbaz or Java?
Toma I like that kind of approach. I like cross-breeding. The most beautiful meetings are the most improbable ones. At the time, Aerosmith and Run DMC was completely improbable, and it's one of the most beautiful meetings. Gainsbourg too... I'm not sure I've heard an album where Sly & Robbie play like that. Yet I've listened to plenty. But I'm not sure there's an album that well arranged, with such technical basslines on every song. That kind of meeting is the most beautiful thing there is. And reggae really is a music that allows it. Vocally as much as musically. Reggae is already a mix, when the guys took American standards and gave them their own sauce. It fits the world today, which is more and more mixed.
Coming back to your album, we expected something more authentic, less "variété".
Toma More authentic? That word doesn't suit me because as long as I love the tracks, nobody can tell me it doesn't suit me. I'm not betraying myself by making these songs. What you mean by "variété" is perhaps slightly more popular choruses. Me, I love pop arrangements, French chanson. I've always loved strings, melody more than rhythm. I've loved pop forever. I listen to James Blunt, The Servant, loving it like crazy. It's really an artistic choice, and I like this album. I signed off on every track, it's really what I want to give people.
Do you have an idea of the audience you want to address?
Toma Everybody. I want to present my music to as many people as possible, but that doesn't mean doing things that don't resemble you. An artist who lasts is an artist who is true to himself. I won't make concessions on the music. The only criticism I take is what I ask for. With the two other Thomases, I get that feedback on my work. It's artistically viable, and it's a unit that suits me. I don't want to change it, even for the next record.
What is your state of mind as the album comes out?
Toma I'm a rabid dog. I'm hungry for the stage. Hungry for everything. I want to carry this record, it's important to me. Really.
Are you already thinking about the second album?
Toma Sometimes I think about it. I think it's going to be... I think it needs to be a bit more stripped back. Slightly fewer arrangements, with a few more features. But these are only fantasies.
Are these things you already see as "flaws" on this album?
Toma I'm not saying I wouldn't do them, but I'd perhaps do them less, I'd put fewer tracks everywhere. I think on this record we didn't want to miss, we were trying to give the best of ourselves. I like the result, so that's fine. But if I made another record, I'd do more live tracks, with a whole team. It would be more live, more acoustic. I think there'd be just as many pop songs, even more. But it's always going to be fairly minor-key, fairly melancholic and nostalgic. That's my thing.
Comments (13)
kev · · rating: 5 out of 5
yout · · rating: 4 out of 5
il apporte son talent sa créativité , je ne dis pas que des gars comme krys sael admiral t ou nyala devraient prendre exemple sur lui mais mr toma marque sa difference avec son album et puis peut-être va t il inventer un nouveau style de reggea ou dancehall .
en tout cas un gros big up a mr toma main dans la main est la meilleur chanson de l album . limé mic' la !!
Madininaman93 · · rating: 5 out of 5
guillom · · rating: 5 out of 5
xela · · rating: 4 out of 5
gb
gbougard · · rating: 2 out of 5
Pour ce qui est des détracteurs, c'est vrai que mr Toma à la voix affutée pour le raggae mais faut voir plus loin et plus large.
Bonne continuation à lui et ces compères.
General Urko · · rating: 5 out of 5
Mikee G.Starr · · rating: 5 out of 5
alphaYoDa · · rating: 5 out of 5
Jean Louis · · rating: 5 out of 5
Roots Addict · · rating: 1 out of 5
Scalp · · rating: 1 out of 5
boby · · rating: 1 out of 5