Role Model’s new music is horny…and romantic

Role Model, aka Tucker Pillsbury, has been churning out music since the release of his first EP, Arizona In the Summer, in 2017. Although the 24-year old singer-songwriter is no noob to the music scene, his debut album Rx sees a new side of him. He’s in love! Falling in love is a wonderful thing that most people welcome with open arms, but when the majority of your discovery is about hating relationships, it’s hard not to be concerned about how your music will continue to thrive and how your fans will continue to relate. Luckily, Role Model has proved he can make beautiful music no matter his relationship status. 

The 11-track album is intimate and, as he describes it, horny. Vulnerable lyrics are paired with pretty, well-crafted instrumentation. Everyone writes about love, but Role Model finds a fresh way to do it. He says whatever he wants and doesn’t care what you think about it. Most songs are upbeat, making them perfect to perform on his world tour that starts this month in Arizona and takes him all the way to Barcelona in September. 

Flaunt caught up with Role Model to talk about his first Coachella performance, how being in love has changed his music, Tik Tok hate, and more. Read the conversation below! 

Tell me about Coachella, had you attended before?

Yeah, in 2019 I went for like half a day last minute because I snaked my way into getting an artist pass and finally drove up there. Saw like 10 minutes of Tame Impala and then left and climbed over the wall of an apartment neighborhood or something and then climbed over a fence and slept on some pool chair in the middle oh God knows where Palm Springs. So this was a big step up. I had a little green room and stuff and proper sleeping arrangements. 

You’re performing weekend number two, too. What are you looking forward to?

I'm excited to not be going to every single party this time. It'll be nice to play the show and then get the fuck out of there. But I don't know. The performance was great. It was amazing. Super happy with it. We had like one fuckup which was my fault. I kicked a water bottle halfway through the performance and then it perfectly hit all of our electrical sound boards. And so we were losing sound for a couple of songs here and there. So you know, you learn. Now I won't be kicking a water bottle in that direction.

What are some other lessons you've learned from performing live?

I don't drink Celsius before I go on stage because that makes me out of breath immediately. So I stopped doing that. And now I can move around and dance a little bit more. I stress about—you can't win with a setlist. There's always going to be someone that's unhappy. You just can't win with it. But I tried really hard for this tour to include everything that people would complain about. So I'm excited for that. I'll be curious to see if that makes everyone happy. The shows are just so fun and very inclusive and we're all kind of like singing the songs together. It's fun. 

What's your favorite song to perform live?

I think some of the new stuff. I would say “strip club music” is really fun. We end with “forever & more” and we like extend it and it just goes forever. And that's a favorite. Yeah, I just like upbeat stuff. It's fun. I’m probably the most energetic in my life when I'm on stage, which is not how I am off stage. But all the upbeat stuff is cool.

Is there a song that you really love but you just don't like performing live?

As of right now, “masturbation song.” It is getting ripped apart right now and it's a very polarizing song. But I wanted to include it on the setlist because it is genuinely like one of my favorite songs. And we'll see if it grows on people, but I know it's making some people angry.

It's getting ripped apart online, but people are listening to it. Everybody is talking about it.

I guess it's good. I feel like I keep saying this to my team, but I feel like we made it too far without an issue like this. So it was bound to happen. It almost doesn't feel like it's really about the song. It feels like they have some other issues with me or the subject. But I hope seeing it live is going to maybe win some people over I hope because it's very pretty.

How do you usually deal with hate or non-constructive criticism? Do you just kind of poke fun at it and then ignore it? Or is this the first time you've really seen non-constructive criticism on this level?

Not to sound hot-headed or anything, but it really is, like the first time—which is another reason why I never wanted relationship stuff to be public, because I think it changes the way people listen to music, which is brutal. But aside from that, I was on Tik Tok in the thick of all that hate, and reading it, it got to me for a sec. And then it's like, you realize they're just bored people and I feel bad that that's how they spend their time. And that's fine. Again, it's doing well. So, yeah, keep doing what you're doing and I'm gonna stay off Tik Tok. I don't go on there very often, everything else is fine. It's the one that promotes and incentivizes hate and bullying. You get points when you say the worst shit. 

I also feel like once you reach a certain point, once you have a certain amount of followers, people are going to find something to hate on you. Tik Tok also has this herd mentality. One person could be like, oh, I hate this song and then people just like it and it blows up. They're like, yeah, I hate the song too, and I don't know why, but I hate it.

I mean, people are hating on the fucking Harry Styles song like, what about that could you possibly hate? I think people just love to have an opposing opinion. I do the same thing. Like, if I see a bunch of people wearing Heavn by Marc Jacobs, I'm like, I don't like Heavn anymore, shit got saturated. Like I get it. I do the same thing. But I think people just want to have a different opinion than everyone else and will do whatever they can to find that.

Are you a person who likes to be on the road? Are you usually a homebody?

I'm definitely a homebody but I have figured out a way to turn the tour bus into my living room and just do my routine just in a tour bus, so it's not bad. And we tour with a really great group of people. So it's fun.

What are those touring essentials that you need to make it feel like home?

Noise canceling headphones. It is a bus full of boys, so I like to block that out even though I love them, they're great guys but I like my quiet time. Kind of like closing the back door and writing and stuff and having my own space to drink my coffee and watch my stupid little videos and everything and keep myself like calm and going runs here and there. 

Was there ever a second with any of these songs or with “masturbation song” where you were like, oh man I don't know if I can say that. Are you an open book?

In the moment, I think it's just like whatever comes to mind. Say it, write it down, there's definitely no filter in the moment. When it comes to releasing, I guess I didn't really have a doubt about “masturbation song” at all. Like that really was an early on song that was for sure making the album. But I think some of the Jesus references were starting to freak me out because there's definitely a few of them and they're a little bit iffy. But I've said it before, none of those songs are about Jesus Christ. And that should be relatively obvious. You know, it is not a new thing to be using religious references or anything but that was the only fear I had.

You were worried about upsetting your Christian fans?

I lost quite a few followers when I put out “if jesus saves she’s my type” which is unfortunate, but if you can't understand that then it's good to clean house a little bit. But yeah, that and then like, ‘I Saw Jesus Kissing On The Same Sex, Dancing To Some Aphex.’ I was like it's not about Jesus. So it's like, if you can't, if you can't understand that…

How has being in a relationship changed your approach to music?

I was scared of the fact that when I first came into music, Arizona In the Summer days, my first EP, second EP even, was very anti-love. Everything I wrote about was anti-love, fuck relationships, fuck everyone, anti love in general. So people relate to those songs and so I was really scared that my brand and falling in love would fuck all that up and I would lose a lot of people. But I have started to realize, my core group of people that listen to my music just care that I'm happier now, doing better mentally. I think you can hear it in a lot of these songs. So, I think I definitely was scared it would change my music for the worse but I think it's for the better. I can't complain. Things are going well for now. 

Plus, I feel like it was relatable for people when you were writing about how you didn't like to be in relationships and how you hated love, but I feel like you probably just have a new group of people who relate to your music now.

Yeah, I think the whole idea with the album, too, is I wanted to give those people from the first EP days, the early on fans, I wanted to ideally give them hope if they identified with those early on songs then I hope that this I hope that it gives them hope.

How would you describe your sound to somebody who has never listened to you before?

Horny pop music/R&B.

If somebody hasn’t listened to your music, but they want to get into it, what's the first song you recommend they listen to?

That's a really good question. Damn. I'm always scared because I feel like someone's gonna hate the first song they listen to and give up.  It would for sure be on the album. I guess “neverletyougo.” Maybe, but I don't know. “strip club music”, fuck it.

What do you think separates you from other artists and what makes you and your music unique?

I guess it's like perspective stuff. Or, again, not wanting to filter. I would say if there's any artist that I look up to is probably Matty Healy and I learned a lot from him. I just met him the other night and bawled my eyes out, but I think I look up to him in a way because he doesn't filter anything. He talks about not being able to take a shit in a hotel room with a girl that you just started dating. I love that type of stuff, because it's very real and weirdly relatable. So yeah, I tried to push myself with filtering.