Another week, another EP for you to all enjoy!
BIMM Institute Dublin’s Toshín are a vibrant six-piece whose sound takes influence from a variety of genres, from early Motown to modern soul and RnB. They’re making a name in the Irish music scene, even being named as one of GoldenPlec’s Plec Picks for 2020. Their debut EP is sure to have you dancing around the room.
What was your inspiration when you began writing the EP?
Our inspiration behind writing the EP was letting out all our emotions through music. It’s about feeling good about yourself and being the best you can be. It’s also a mixture of emotions; ‘Oh Lord’ is about daddy issues, ‘Seriously’ is about being a queen, and ‘Eat Sleep’ is about trying to get the ride. Isn’t that what we all go through?”
Are there any artists that inspire you when writing?
I guess we all come from slightly different musical backgrounds, so there’s a lot of different stuff in there. Artists like Snarky Puppy, Tank and the Bangas, Hiatus Kayote and more would be some of them.
What is key to your sound and how do you make your music stand out?
Bb Minor. We just try and write music that we like and hope the mixture of influences makes the music speak for itself.
How does your songwriting process work?
It usually starts with our guitarist Taran writing a piece of music. We then write some lyrics for it, either by myself, Taran, or a co-writer (such as Zapho), and we bring it to the band and let it come together as a group.
Describe your sound in three words…
Funky Pop-Soul.
How has studying at BIMM Institute helped you develop as an artist?
It has made us learn so much more about our instruments and about different styles of music that we ended up introducing into Toshín. It also brought all of us together and allowed us a creative space to craft our songs and build a relationship as musicians.
What’s next for you?
We just finished our first Irish tour, so we are going to take it easy for the next couple of months and focus on writing new material for our album.
