Tim Atlas - QUOTA EP
Biography of the new EP from rising bedroom pop producer who looks to expand his vision with his most diverse and deeply personal release yet
“Throughout the last year, I’ve felt the full spectrum of emotions, feeling balanced in my life then unbalanced, bouncing back and forth.” This is how we find LA-based producer and songwriter Tim Atlas at the end of this historic and tumultuous year. Not letting it disrupt his flow, Atlas has used this continuous tipping between light and dark, optimistic and pessimistic, to fuel his new EP, Quota, the most accomplished and cohesive release in his still-young career.
Having started the earliest seeds pre-pandemic, Atlas found himself forced to transplant his studio to his living room in order to keep working once the stay-at-home order took hold. Rather than limit him, he found it freeing; “To be in my apartment with nothing but me, my girlfriend and my dog for weeks allowed me to be in a different headspace,” he reflects. “It was inspirational to get outside of where I usually work; that’s where the magic came out.”
What results is a set of pristine modern pop songs that can’t be pinned down to one genre or style. With a sound that can trace its lineage back to the cerebral arrangements of Tame Impala, the timeless pop of The Gap Band, and the moody contemplation of Men I Trust, Quota finds Atlas sonically growing, even as it finds the self-confessed introvert coming to terms with the added strains of a life in lockdown.
To aid him in maintaining equanimity during these tough times, Atlas found himself embarking on some new hobbies. Plants have come to occupy a large portion of his household – certainly more than his studio – “my personality is just to become obsessed with something and wanting to know everything about this one thing,” he admits. “Plants was one of them.” Creatively, he reignited a long-held passion for writing, taking David Sedaris’ MasterClass on storytelling, which has certainly fed into the vivid lyricism of Quota.
After an attention-grabbing introduction, Quota kicks into gear with the Honeywhip duet “Peace At Last”, where Atlas begins “Found myself spinning out down an icy hill” – and with that short but immersive image, delivered over glistening keys, we’re sucked into his world and mindset. Although initially written as a meditation on the exhaustion at the end of a long tour, the blissful “Peace At Last” has come to take on a different, much more positive meaning in the wake of the Presidential election. This is captured in the uplifting video, which Atlas directed himself, showing reactions from disparate groups of people who have been wronged by the former President, now able to take that stress off their minds. “I wanted to show solidarity among people of different backgrounds,” Atlas reflects. “Directing the video really feels like an extension of my artistry.”
Quota displays further commitment to concept as it swings like moods, and from the liberating peak of “Peace At Last” Atlas plunges us straight into iciness with “Water”. It finds the singer in a downcast state, disconnected from the happiness of the world around him, evocatively describing his depression as both water that engulfs him and a monster circling beneath the surface. Wringing out every ounce of empathy in “Water”, Atlas has perfectly judged the glacial production, with sparkling yet skeletal synth and some neo-bluesy guitar picking away at his psyche. A fearless display of vulnerability, “Water” encapsulates one of the key draws of creating music for Atlas; “One of my favorite parts about being an artist is having an avenue to speak about this stuff, because most people don’t want to talk about those things in an actual conversation” he reflects. “So to have a medium like music, where I can be vulnerable, is something I’m actually really grateful for.”
Then the pendulum swings again and we find Atlas in full flow on “Courtside”, a slick modern production that weaves its way between pop, R&B and indie. It gives the singer a chance to show off his keen and characterful lyricism as it flows, finding him observing someone as they “walk into a room / like you’re burning down the West Coast.” Even as the sound of “Courtside” is confident and irresistible, it still finds Atlas receding into his mind, dreaming “wanna wake up next to you / with a courtside view / you’re out of my league / but you’re in my room.”
This balance between positivity and insularity is something that Atlas is cultivating in his music. “It’s funny because I think it’s hard to write a happy or positive song, because that’s not naturally where we gravitate as songwriters,” he admits. “Take the progression of “Courtside”, there’s a lot of really minor stuff about it, as opposed to it feeling major. But when it all came together it just became this summery bop – it’s interesting how it happened that way.”
A similar dichotomy of bold production and uncertain psychology is proudly on display in the EP’s closer, “Wallflower”. An emphatic and downright funky track, ripe with thudding bass, tropical drums and an earworm hook, it finds Atlas forcing himself out of his comfort zone in order to impress the object of his attraction; “Tell me what you like / I know I’m usually not your type.” Given the alluring bounce of his music making, not to mention the charm of his modesty, there’s no doubt Atlas wins them over in the end as he coyly admits “Can’t shut my eyes when I’m with you.”
At the end of Quota, what has been a fairly short experience still feels like a deep and emotional one. “I hope it shows a little more of me,” Atlas affirms. “A big thing for me as an artist is to really give people a full spectrum view of who I am as a person, so I hope they can see more of that.” There’s no doubt that, with Quota, we now see Tim Atlas more clearly than ever, and it just makes us more excited for what he might do next.
