10 Questions for TMCLS

We don’t really do interviews. That’s never been our thing. Let the music do the talking, we’re not here to explain every scream or synth line. But people kept asking questions, and we get it. So here’s something honest. Ten real questions we’ve actually been asked and answered the way we live: raw, unfiltered, and in our own time. This isn’t a press piece either. It’s a glimpse into what TMCLS is, for us, and why we made this. No spotlights. No smiles for the camera. Our truth, when you're ready to hear it.1. Why don’t you play live shows?
Vee: When I was a kid, maybe eight or nine, I had to sing at this school thing, some kind of end-of-year assembly with streamers and folding chairs and that weird smell of cafeteria pizza. I got up there, looked out, and just froze. Totally forgot the lyrics. I stood there, quiet as a ghost, until a teacher walked me off stage. Man…
The part that stuck with me wasn’t that I messed up. It was that no one said anything afterward. No “Hey, you okay?” Not even a joke. It was like I didn’t exist at all. And I think that moment carved something into me. The feeling of being invisible even when everyone’s looking.
With TMCLS, we’re not trying to avoid performing. We just never built this project for a stage. It’s not that kind of thing, at least, not now. Our music feels more like an exorcism than a concert. It’s where I go to get the noise out of my chest. I don’t want to turn that into a show with ticket links and light cues. Our band isn’t here to be clapped for. It’s here because we didn’t know where else to put all this stuff inside us.
Odin: We rehearse in this studio in Antwerp that smells like beer, old cables, dusty amps, coffee that’s been left out too long, and sometimes incense when Vee’s feeling intense. It’s not glamorous. In winter, you can literally see your breath when you talk. But that place has something. It’s where we figured out who we are. Oh, and that room has seen everything. All the arguments. The breakdowns. The weird experiments that never made it into songs. It’s where we trust the process, no matter how messy it gets.
I don’t think we’ve ever been against playing live. We just don’t want to turn something real into something performative. What we do feels private. Sacred, even. You can’t put that on a stage and expect it to mean the same thing.
If we ever do a show, it’ll be because we need to, not because it fits the timeline or because someone tells us it’s what bands are supposed to do. It'll be for the people who already get it. We’ll see, we’re happy as it is now.2. What’s your creative process like?
Odin: I usually start by ruining a perfectly good sound. I’ll take a clean synth and filter it into something that sounds like it’s gasping for breath. That’s when I know I’m close to something real. Then Vee hears it, and something in her shifts. She disappears into a notebook for hours and comes back with three lines that rip your chest open.
Vee: Sometimes I don’t write the lyrics. They basically write themselves. I once wrote a full verse on the back of a grocery receipt in a tram on a rainy day. It was the exact rhythm the wheels made that sparked it. That line ended up in “Not Once, Not Now.”
Rycko: For me, it’s movement. I (finger) drum what I feel. No grid at first. I let it be chaotic. Then I sculpt it down. I spend more time muting than playing. Sometimes I think silence is our fourth member.3. What’s the story behind your first single, “Breaking My Own Mind”?
Vee: It started during lockdown. One of those weeks where every day felt the same and time didn’t move right. I had barely spoken to anyone in days. I wasn’t writing, I wasn’t listening to music. Just silence and that weird hum that your brain makes when it’s too quiet for too long.
I ended up sitting in the bathtub one night. Not taking a bath. Not doing anything. Just sitting there in jeans and a hoodie with the lights off and the water cold because I couldn’t bring myself to stand up. I remember staring at the faucet for, like, two hours, thinking about how weird it is that your mind can turn into a cage even when you’re free to leave.
That’s where the line came from “I keep building walls from mirrors.” Because that’s what it felt like. I wasn’t trapped by someone else. I was trapping myself, reflecting everything back on me until I couldn’t tell what was real anymore.
Writing that verse was like finding a crack in the glass. It wasn’t pretty, it wasn’t even poetic when it happened. But later, when I brought it to the guys, I think they understood it right away.
Odin: Yeah, I remember that week. I hadn’t slept properly in days. My sleep patterns were already trash, but during lockdown it got worse. I’d be up until 4 or 5 in the morning just scrolling or staring at the ceiling. One night I had a panic attack, like, full-on chest pressure, can’t-breathe kind of thing, and I grabbed my headphones and just started recording.
The synth line in that song came from that exact moment. It was this warped, slow-burning loop that felt like a heart monitor but broken like if a heartbeat was trying to keep calm and failing. I wasn’t planning to use it. It was just a sound I made to try and calm myself down.
A few days later, I played it for Vee, and she got this look like, “That’s it.” Like we’d both been drowning in our own heads and somehow recorded the sound of that.
We built everything around that loop. Didn’t fix the distortion. Didn’t clean it up. It had to feel like a mind unraveling. You know how sometimes the ugliest take is the most honest one? That’s what this track is. No polish. Just truth.4. Who are your biggest musical influences?
Odin: I grew up listening to Nine Inch Nails, Faith No More and Aphex Twin because they confused me. That discomfort pulled me in. Now I chase that same confusion when I write.
Rycko: There was this one underground German drummer in the early 2000s who used to mic up trash cans and car parts. I found a bootleg of his session once and looped it for weeks. That guy made rhythm feel like violence. I try to bring some of that rawness into our sound.
Vee: It’s always hard to give just one answer to that. I grew up with this weird mix of burned CDs and MTV2 reruns. One week I was obsessed with Guano Apes, screaming “Open Your Eyes” in my bedroom like it was a war cry, and the next I’d be singing along to early Paramore with my hairbrush as a mic. And then there was Panic! At The Disco, the first album, the theatrical chaos of it. I still remember lying on the floor of my room with the volume way too high, thinking, “Wait, music can sound like this?” It felt like a circus and a love letter all at once. I never got over that.
But later I found the darker stuff. Deftones was a turning point for me. The way Chino can whisper and scream in the same breath, like he’s choking on emotion, that stuck with me. Same with Lacuna Coil, Cristina’s voice was this strange mix of elegance and weight. It taught me that you can be melodic and heavy at the same time without compromising either side.
And yeah, old hip hop too. I don’t always talk about it, but I was deep into Nas and Lauryn Hill. Even some Wu-Tang, GZA, ODB, Method Man… I loved how it was all about rhythm and attitude. There’s something so raw in that storytelling: no filters, just experience. That shaped the way I write lyrics more than most people would guess.
So yeah. I guess TMCLS kind of pulls from all of that. Loud guitars, weird drama, eerie textures, and a need to say something real, even if it’s uncomfortable. Especially if it’s uncomfortable.5. Are you anti-social media or just off-grid?
Odin: Honestly, we just don’t want to participate in the digital talent show. It’s not a moral crusade. It’s exhaustion. I tried running a page once. It turned into a full-time job pretending I was happy and productive. That’s not music.
Vee: I had a post once that said, “I’m not okay today,” and it got 4 likes. But a photo of my salad lunch? 70 likes. That told me everything I needed to know.6. What’s your favorite lyric you’ve written?
Vee: From “Lost Signal” - “the loneliness is louder than the noise we’ve built so strong.”
I wrote that in the middle of a night. We had stacked so many layers: distortion, drums, synths, like we were trying to bury something. But the emotional silence inside me still screamed louder. That’s what the line means. You can build up a wall, of sound, of life, of everything, but loneliness will still seep through.
And it’s not just mine. I see it everywhere. It’s like the disease of our generation. And I think it’ll be even worse for the next. Everyone’s connected but no one’s really seen. That kind of emptiness, it hides under the noise until it explodes.
That lyric came actually out fast. It wasn’t written to be clever. It was just the truth in that moment. And those are usually the ones I keep.7. What’s your relationship like as a band?
Vee: We’ve been fighting since before TMCLS had a name since before we knew what distortion pedals were. Odin’s five years older, and when we were kids, he treated me like I was a mosquito with opinions. I wanted to be part of whatever he was doing sneaking into his room, stealing his CDs, trying to copy his sketches and he hated it. We’d scream at each other over everything. But here’s the thing: we never stopped orbiting each other. Even when we were angry, even when we weren’t talking, there was always this pull. Music made that connection louder.
Now, in the studio, we don’t have to explain much. I’ll hum something, and Odin knows what key I’m in before I do. He’ll start a melody, and I’ll already be writing the words in my head. Our fights still happen. We still slam doors. But sometimes those fights become songs.
Rycko: I joined later, when they were already this storm. At first, I felt like I was stepping into a very loud family argument that never fully ended. But there’s a rhythm to their chaos. A language. And eventually, it became mine too. I know when to step in and when to shut up.Vee: Honestly, we’re both really grateful for Rycko. He brings balance. He knows when to jump in and when to just let us fight it out. And he never takes sides, which is kind of a miracle. Without him, this would just be another family argument with guitars. With him, it's a band. Plus he brings in the tech stuff and effects.8. Is TMCLS a phase or a forever thing?
Vee: This isn’t a hobby or a side project. It’s what kept me from falling apart more than once. TMCLS is the shape my healing takes. It’s how I process things I can’t say out loud, even to people I love. I work as a freelance designer during the day, fully remote. I’ve got deadlines, meetings, moodboards, brand guides… the whole digital circus. But the second I log off, the real work starts. The emotional kind. That’s what TMCLS is for me. It’s not something I’ll grow out of.
Odin: I’ve been working in electronics since we moved to Antwerp. It pays the bills. Soldering tiny components onto boards all day has its own weird rhythm, but it’s not who I am. It’s just what I do. We’re not trying to “build something” in that sense. It’s not a business. It’s a sound we have to make. It comes from somewhere that doesn’t care if we have time, energy, or listeners. It just needs to come out.
If the day ever comes where we don’t need it anymore maybe that’s when it’ll end. But not until then. Not even close.
Rycko: I’ve been cutting up sounds since I was fifteen, mangling samples, messing with broken gear, making loops out of microwave beeps and garbage truck alarms.
By day, I teach computer science just outside Brussels. Programming, electronics, sound design when I can sneak it in. It’s a good life. But when I get home, my brain doesn’t shut off. I dive into pedals, samplers, glitches, textures. I build patches at 1am just to see how ugly I can make a clean sound.9. What do you want people to feel when they listen to your music?
Rycko: Like they’re not alone. Even in the darkest room. Especially in the darkest room.
Vee: I want them to feel like someone whispered their own secret back to them in a language they didn’t know they knew. OK, that was deep, I admit (laughs)10. What happens when TMCLS finally performs live?
Vee: We like how it is now. No pressure, no pretending. But yeah, we’d need more people on stage to pull it off right. There's too much going on sonically. And honestly, I just wanna see how Rycko pulls off his chaos and tricks live. Especially on “Not Once, Not Now”, he went full mad scientist on that one.