TOKiMONSTA performs on the 2022 Coachella music competition.
Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Photos for Coachella
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Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Photos for Coachella
TOKiMONSTA performs on the 2022 Coachella music competition.
Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Photos for Coachella
Listening to her now, it is exhausting to fathom that there was a time just some years in the past when digital music producer and DJ Jennifer Lee — aka TOKiMONSTA — suffered from aphasia so extreme that she was unable to talk.
In 2015, TOKiMONSTA was identified with Moyamoya illness, a uncommon progressive cerebrovascular dysfunction that put her susceptible to a sudden aneurysm or stroke. The 2 mind surgical procedures that adopted, in January 2016, left her with alarming negative effects, together with acute aphasia.
“I could not talk anymore,” TOKiMONSTA says. “English, which was primarily my first language, grew to become a international language. Anytime somebody talked to me, anytime I watched TV, anytime there was a spoken phrase, it simply seemed like a international language.”
Although TOKiMONSTA had taught herself methods to make digital music in school and had created her personal label, Younger Artwork Data, in 2014, after the surgical procedures she discovered that music had develop into unrecognizable, simply noise. “At that time, I spotted one thing was fallacious,” she says.
Simply two months after her mind surgical procedure, TOKiMONSTA pushed herself to start making music once more. Throughout her restoration she created one in every of her most private albums, Lune Rouge. It earned a Grammy nomination for Greatest Dance/Digital Album, making TOKiMONSTA the primary feminine Asian American producer to obtain a nomination within the class.
Wanting again now, TOKiMONSTA describes the connection between her “pondering thoughts” and her music as a bridge. Through the surgical procedure, the bridge was damaged down, however over time it was rebuilt. She now hears and appreciates music simply as she did earlier than — however philosophically, she says, all the pieces has modified.
“I understand how valuable music is,” TOKiMONSTA says. “It is like being starved and having your first chew to eat. Each music has a stage of pleasure to me that’s valuable, and extra valuable as a result of I do know that it may be taken away.”
Interview highlights
On “I Want I Might,” the primary music she wrote after surgical procedure
The primary time I opened up my laptop computer, I had already been capable of converse once more, so I used to be OK talking and listening to individuals on TV. All that stuff had come again. So I believed this was a superb time for me to contemplate making an attempt to create once more. However once I had opened my laptop computer to make music, I spotted that no matter a part of my mind that would do this was not there, but. I attempted, and it was an try, however it was not good in any respect. And it was less than par with how I had been making music. So as an alternative of mulling over it or being depressed, I made a decision simply to close my laptop computer and provides it a break, give myself some extra time to heal. I used to be only a month and a half out of mind surgical procedure. How am I going to make a music?
So I gave myself the time and actually I am fairly positive it was a couple of week later that I simply began making this music and it got here collectively. And the sensation inside that you’ve when anybody makes an incredible music is unimaginable. There’s nothing higher than that feeling. However with this explicit music, it meant a lot extra than simply making a superb music. To me, it meant that I used to be OK. With this music, once I pay attention again, nonetheless brings me again to that second and the way exhausting it was and exhibits me that I can nonetheless be right here to today feeling these emotions, however figuring out I’ve made it this far.
YouTube
On educating herself methods to make digital music in school
My first delve into being artistic with music would most likely be the piano. After I downloaded software program in highschool, that was the primary try at making an attempt to make music. I downloaded a program. I opened it. It regarded so intimidating that I simply uninstalled it, as a result of at the moment computer systems did not have a variety of area. … I put it to relaxation. After which quick ahead to my first 12 months in school. I obtain a distinct manufacturing software program. A pal of mine exhibits me a really primary method to make use of it, and I grew to become obsessed. I used to be watching YouTube tutorials, I used to be occurring the web site, studying their tutorials. … It simply grew to become one thing that grew to become my entire world, my entire focus. It was the pastime of all hobbies. I lastly found out a option to categorical all these concepts that I had swirling inside me.
On doing discipline recordings to combine into her music
I really feel like there’s one thing about discipline recordings, which is what we name this, that offers your music a selected sonic signature that nobody else could have. As a result of if I file the waves crashing, or an airplane flying overhead, that specific second will solely occur as soon as in time. You may by no means have the ability to recreate that very same wave or that very same airplane or that very same automotive door shutting. And in that method, that music that I apply it to will even stay utterly distinctive.
Origins of her DJ title “TOKiMONSTA”
Briefly, it was a chat display screen title. All of us had one again within the day. And I’ve additionally come to comprehend a variety of different musicians have used their chat title as their artist title. You simply need to ask round. So “tokki” means rabbit in Korean, “monsta,” I assume I believed it was a cool option to write monster once I was 16. However I can not take it again as a result of this has been my title now for a few years.
TOKiMONSTA attends Meta Home at Miami Artwork Week on Dec. 03, 2022.
Tasos Katopodis/Getty Photos for Meta
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Tasos Katopodis/Getty Photos for Meta
TOKiMONSTA attends Meta Home at Miami Artwork Week on Dec. 03, 2022.
Tasos Katopodis/Getty Photos for Meta
Within the very starting, possibly if you see “TOKiMONSTA,” you assume that I make actually aggressive music and I feel I have been round lengthy sufficient and other people know that, “Oh, TOKiMONSTA makes like cool, chill, enjoyable stuff.” I’ve redefined what it means to be TOKiMONSTA. And in lots of ways in which title represents me due to the juxtaposition of “tokki,” which is de facto cute after which “monsta,” which is that this scary being. It exhibits very a lot within the music that I make. There are moments the place my music may be very quiet after which I’ve music the place moments the place my music is loud, are stunning and disturbing or gentle or heavy. And now greater than ever, I do really feel like I establish with my title and I am proud to have or not it’s part of my life.
On acting at Coachella in 2016 in entrance of 15,000 individuals
Once you take a look at a bunch of individuals like that, they virtually develop into one organism. And on this shared expertise, all of us develop into this one dwelling, respiration factor. And their vitality is a mirrored image of my vitality and forwards and backwards. We’re simply drops of water undulating on this large sea. And I assume for me, it was one other signal that I had handed the worst half. I used to be bodily in a position once more to carry out. I used to be capable of really feel assured once more at that second.
On digital music being male-dominated
For instance 10 or 13 years in the past once I was simply making beats in LA with my friends, I did not need anybody to know that I used to be a lady. I did not need anybody to know what I might seem like. So if we take into consideration that MySpace period when everybody had their songs listed, you had your prime eight or no matter. I by no means posted my picture on my accounts. I needed it to be a thriller as a result of I did not assume it was needed to indicate my id, because it may very well be used as a way to guage my music unfairly. And that was the fact at the moment. It is most likely nonetheless the fact to a point now, although I feel it is improved quite a bit.
[When I started,] individuals had been attributing my very own abilities to males I had dated, or they assumed that there was no method it may have been coming from me and will need to have been another person making it for [me]. And due to the atmosphere that I used to be in, it made it so essential for me to indicate everybody that I make the music that I make. It grew to become essential for me to additionally combine down and engineer all of the music I make, so individuals knew that this particular person was doing all of it.
Lauren Krenzel and Susan Nyakundi produced and edited this interview for broadcast. Bridget Bentz, Molly Seavy-Nesper and Lars Gotrich tailored it for the net.
