Real Goblin

Truman Sinclair’s brand of indie folk has a kind of authenticity to it that isn’t always replicated by his contemporaries. I first heard it last year in one of the many moments I found myself lying on the carpet with my headphones on. Amidst an algorithmically fed playlist of lo-fi acoustic tracks, Truman Sinclair stood out. His 2024 EP, Pale Moon Pale Horse, is one of my favorite projects of the past year. I’m a sucker for a guitar and a harmonica, but it takes a special kind of song to stick with me the way Truman’s music did. While sonically consistent, there was a display of range on that EP that struck me as unique. So, when Truman began to tease his debut album, I was thrilled.

He describes his upcoming album, American Recordings, as a kind of reminder of a better America. Truman’s discontent with the state of the world around him has manifested in a very wholesome way – which is ironic given his background in emo rock. During our interview, he likened this project to the way people will empathize with a morally questionable person despite their flaws. Sort of a BoJack Horseman effect, if you will. A deeply flawed character is still capable of drawing sympathy from the audience. If America is BoJack, then we are his beleaguered peers, tolerating his behavior for the fleeting memory of good times shared.

There’s an admirable quality to even the mere attempt at seeing the good in things these days. Falling into a spiral of hopeless pessimism (or worse, apathy) is all too easy. True to Truman’s description, American Recordings has shades of classic Americana and folk music (a genre born out of a similar protest and a desire for a better world).

I was able to chat with Truman about his experience in the Chicago and LA music scenes, his influences, and his thoughts on his debut solo album.

The following is an abridged version of my conversation with Truman. The full interview is available here.

This interview took place a few days before the Chiefs blowout loss, and a little more than a week before American Recordings is set to release. I asked Truman if he was a football fan before we began. Despite being from Chicago, Truman grew up a Steelers fan. Interestingly, Truman is not the first Chicago-born Steelers fan I’ve spoken to. Which perhaps says more about the state of the Bears than anything else. I shared that I joined most of the City of Buffalo in grieving the AFC Championship loss. Truman reassured me: “There’s always next year.” He was kind enough to let me get my Buffalo-related melancholy off my chest before beginning.

Real Goblin: So how are you feeling? This is not your first foray into releasing an album, but this is your first solo project. How are you feeling leading up to that?

Truman: I feel like I’m in a whole new world. But obviously things are familiar about it. It’s almost like you’re in a dream or something because it’s like I’ve done this before in a different way. I think this new thing is in a lot of ways a continuation of what I was doing before and in a lot of ways something completely new and I think it’s been really, really fun. I mean, there’s been all these new challenges and all these new things that I didn’t expect to be so great about it. And I think the best part is that I’m working with a lot of the same people.

Impressively, Truman has taken to self-producing his debut record. Each single feels clean, balanced, and gentle on the ears. The production has been consistently impressive and true to Sinclair’s vision for the project.

Real Goblin: I knew about Frat Mouse, but… I was so giddy when I found this out – that you’re in Fat, Evil Children as well.

Truman: Those are some of my best friends. I love those guys. I mean, obviously I’m in the band or whatever, but beyond the band, we’re like great friends. I went to USC and I lived in student housing there for like the last two years. And behind where I lived, there was this garage and it was like a perfect music making space…Somebody actually left a grand piano in there, which was crazy. It was from Chicago, which is where I’m from. But we made that whole record in that garage. And then right after it, I made my whole record in the garage. So it’s like, we’re very intertwined. And I play with them all the time. I just play lead guitar live. I don’t sing or anything. So it’s really fun. It’s a completely different experience.

Truman was born and raised in Chicago, Illinois. He got his start very early on at just 8 years old. Listeners of his solo material may be surprised to discover that some of his first band experiences were in emo and metal. It wasn’t until he was 14 that he moved to LA and found an appreciation for folk music. In trying to acclimate to his new environment, Truman fell in love with songwriting. Ultimately, he credits this time experimenting with music alone as the means to finding likeminded musicians in California.

Truman: That’s how I found my place like in California for sure. Like being the kid who like had Logic on his computer and like wants to record. Then I had a couple of bands…then I had Frat Mouse, and then that became more of a thing. And I think through Frat Mouse, I developed a love of performing live because we were playing all the time. And

I was a runner for a producer in LA – still am actually…I always wanted to be a music producer. I can understand how somebody wouldn’t trust you to produce their record unless they’ve heard something that you’ve made that they like. So I was like, okay, I’m going to make my debut album. I’m gonna go super hard and do this side project so I can like express a side of myself and use it as like a resume. And then through doing that, it just has blossomed into this whole other thing. I’ve always been a songwriter, so I knew I loved that…But like it was sort of by accident, like one step at a time is what it feels like.

Real Goblin: Is this a full solo project or is it still very collaborative?

Truman: I was always the head producer for Frat Mouse. And what I mean by that is like we did it on my laptop in my bedroom. But we were all together and we would all throw stuff out. Everything on this record…I was definitely alone for all of it. I wrote and made all of it alone, I played all the guitars, all the bases, and all the shakers and everything. My friend Ben played the drums. But I recorded it with a drum machine and then we did the [live] drums last and everything…I was waking up at like 6 a.m., making the music before I’d go to class, and then coming back and working until midnight. I was like completely obsessed for like three or four months…it was like one of those really beautiful things where like you’re super inspired, you have something to say and you have a way to say it and you have a place to do it. And you have time. It was amazing.

It was strangely not lonely.

I feel like I’m not somebody – I mean, I do like to spend a lot of time alone – but I’m not necessarily somebody who’s like, “oh, I love being alone or whatever”. But whenever I’m making music… I just don’t feel alone. But I’m alone for so many hours. But it was great, it was fun.

Real Goblin: Is there any kind of process where – you follow a certain set of steps along the way? Or is it always just kind of, you find it as you go?

Truman: I think not being precious about it and trying to find it as you go is a good strategy. Because I think that you don’t know…I think everybody’s changing so much every day. So like, what is going to work best today is not what is going to work best tomorrow…But with that being said, I definitely found a way to express the types of feelings I was having at that period of my life. I knew that I was going to put these instruments on it at the very least. And then I would go and do that….it would be like electric guitar and acoustic guitar, drums and bass, and a tambourine and maybe a harmonica. That was like the general primary colors that I knew was gonna be on…pretty much every song….But I think what was cool about this project…I had an outlet for the songs and like had a general world that I was working in and that developed pretty early on.

American Recordings feels simultaneously explorative and well within Truman’s comfort zone. The various ideas, sounds, and themes he explores are truly the standout of this project. Conceptually, it succeeds where similar projects might fall flat.

Real Goblin: Were there any specific artists that you were listening to a lot at the time that you feel like influenced [the record]?

Truman: A huge influence is…Waxahatchee, who I love dearly and I know a lot of people love, she’s just amazing. Her album, St. Cloud, is like a spiritual record for me. It’s one of those ones that means more to me than I could express. And then the band Pinegrove as well. Pinegrove was like an all-time inspiration. The way that they were able to make such a specific, unique, cool sound…was extremely inspiring….and then like Neil Young, Bruce Springsteen, I love those guys.

Real Goblin: I could hear a lot of that, especially in the songwriting. Something like “Joel Roberts” is like a kind of old school, story-driven song. Do you have a particular favorite song or one that you’re like most proud of?

Truman: Well, that’s a good question. Yeah, I think “Bloodline”…it’s not out yet, but it’s gonna come out on the record. When I started making this record, it was sort of clear that this record might happen to connect with a wider range of people than the last music I was making….everybody seems to think this is really sick, which was great and I was really happy about that. I was talking to my dad about it and he said…”yeah, this is really cool. If you’re going to do all this though, make sure you sing what you want to say.”

Then for “Bloodline”, I think I really wrote down and…got out what was on my mind in like a moment of clarity. And I think those feel so f*cking good. And I think anybody who writes and I’m sure…anybody who does anything creative or anything at all can relate.

I just wrote the song and it was done and it worked and it was good. Like “Joel Roberts”, I wrote a whole version of that that was vague and didn’t have the story and didn’t have anything – it just had the melody. And then I like scrapped the whole thing and wrote “Joel” and it took like a lot of mining and that’s cool. But “Bloodline” was a clean snap.

Real Goblin: American Recordings comes out February 14th. Is there anything you want listeners to…take away from this album?

Truman: I was trying to be as honest as possible the whole time. For me, this record is about what I love about this country…and there’s so many things I absolutely hate about this country. And a lot of the reason that I love it is because I’m born here and…I can see what’s good about it. And I feel like I can see it’s like when you have empathy for somebody who’s doing something horrible and you’re like, “dude, like you’re fucked up, but I know that you’re just hurt.”

I mean, if anybody talks to me, they know I’m not happy with our politics or the way we run sh*t – but I think that there’s certain cultural things about the country that I really f*ck with and I rep, and those things are in the record….It’s like a document of my life and me hanging out with my friends and everything that I think is beautiful.

Truman Sinclair’s debut album, American Recordings releases this Friday, February 14th, 2025.

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