Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to TOKYO DANIELS!. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
TOKYO, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Can you tell us about a time that your work has been misunderstood? Why do you think it happened and did any interesting insights emerge from the experience?
I feel that my whole life I was misunderstood. Being bipolar and not knowing it, people often seen me as a giant ball of rage rather than a kid struggling to tame his own inner demons. By the time high-school was over for me no one wanted to talk to me really. Even though I was going through all this stuff no one wanted to see that. So eventually I found music and a strong group of people support me through my changes and the process of learning to get better. Now I’m a stronger person because of the things I went through and at that a stronger artist.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
I played around with music around the ages 14-15, but really started to take it serious around 17-18, I’m now 21 and I’ve been rapping since 2020 and released my first EP in 2021 which is still up on SoundCloud. What really brought me in and sold me on music was the creative freedom that can be achieved inside that foam lined booth. I was going through so much mentally & physically. I was forcing myself to become somebody different, somebody better. What sets me apart from the rest is the fact that I listen to criticism and I’m good at bouncing back from bad situations, on top of that i spend a lot of time with my craft, consistently tweaking and revising lines, bars, even single words. One thing everyone should know about me is I’m incredibly stubborn, this is what gives me my ceaseless drive to reach new heights, I cant give up, i always have to keep moving forward. The work that I’m most proud of right now is “THE DOG HOUSE” its my latest EP that will soon be topped by a new unnamed project.
What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?
It’s the most rewarding when people 1. help you have a good turn out at your shows and 2. Tell you how much they like your music. Every artist would be a liar if they said they didn’t love it when people recognized their work. It’s tough to be an artist in todays market so you have to take every ounce of recognition you can get and be sincerely grateful.
Is there mission driving your creative journey?
I wanna help the city out a bit, hold community events, help certain people in my life and inspire the youth to be creative and free. I feel like everything we do can be creative we just gotta see it that way. That starts with us.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://beacons.ai/tokyodaniels
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tokyodaniels/
- Twitter: @tokyo_daniels
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLlJpAxSXIa97D2dFQ4v7Pg/videos
- Other: https://music.apple.com/us/artist/tokyo-daniels/1545675586 https://open.spotify.com/artist/3tWgUFliYVH6UDlj5pIqoW
Image Credits
Images 1-2 – Osher Phototgraphy Images 3-5 – Tommy Luensman