It’s been over six years since we first interviewed this musical legend and a lot has happened since then. We caught up with Tuamie to see what he’s been up to…
For those who may be unfamiliar, Tuamie is one of the greatest producers and musical minds of all-time. He has worked with Jon Bellion, Kooley High, Fly Anakin and Pete Rock to name a few. Now he is regarded as a GRAMMY-nominated producer for his beat Eva-re-moanin which he released in 2014 and is used for the song When The Sun Shines Again on Common and Pete Rock’s new collaborative studio album called The Auditorium Vol. 1. The song has now been nominated for ‘Best Rap Performance’ at the 2025 GRAMMYs. Tuamie has now contributed to a GRAMMY-nominated album, as the album is also nominated for ‘Best Rap Album Of The Year’.
Back in 2018, I sat down with Tuamie for an interview all about his incredible ear for music. Diving into the DJ Premier influence behind his ‘strategized loops’ to why he keeps a low profile and how he stays inspired. Now, he’s back for a new INTHEWRITERSMIND interview, where we discuss music, producing, working with Pete Rock, his dreams and everything in between…
Daniella: Wow, it’s been six years since our last interview. I still feel so in tune with your music. For those who may have missed our very first interview and may be discovering your music for the first time, how would you describe yourself and the music you feel drawn to create?
Tuamie: I would simply describe myself as someone who—makes music and tries to keep that passion to myself. I was told not to say this or think this way, but two years ago my answer to that question would have been that I am music. That was my way of thought, but now that’s not the case. Now I have balance and see two options; you can have life and you can have music as well. Regarding the music, it’s all still me. It’s funny, it’s original, it’s kind of based on DJ Premier. So, if you like Premier, then you might like my stuff too. How would I describe my music? I don’t know. All I can really give is similarities. Most people identify it as, ‘90s but not in the past’. I don’t think that’s the best answer, but I’ve never actually thought about that question, so I’m kinda in the mist of finding that answer now.
Daniella: That’s a very honest answer actually with these kinds of questions there’s always this feeling that you have to have a definitive answer, but that’s not the case. Your answer can be open-ended or even a question back, if you haven’t quite figured it out yet.
Tuamie: Yeah, I always think I’m talking to someone who’s reading it, so I’m tryna speak to them, as if I was reading it. But, being asked on the spot, you really have to think. I think you would have to speak to me to understand the music and how it relates. I can’t say it’s hilarious—I can’t say I am the music if nobody has met me.
Daniella: That’s deep.
Tuamie: Yeah, I guess one example would be I made a beat with the Crystal Waters sample and that was about my mother. So, that’s my answer is my music is me journaling every day. That’s my answer, music is a diary that only I know what’s going on.
Daniella: That’s a great explanation, I love how you found the answer thinking about your process. You know what’s so incredible about that actually. You have these beats that are not necessarily even words or sentences. Just instruments, sounds and rhythms. But you’re able to convey your feelings about the most mundane things through them and in such an extraordinary way. You have these really funny, cool and absurd titles for the songs you make.
Tuamie: Yes, yes! It’s exactly that. What you’re reading, what you’re seeing—that’s the most I can do digitally with the titles and the audio. If you laugh at the titles, you’re gonna be laughing at me and with me. Yeah, that’s basically it.
Daniella: I see your song titles and it’s just pure humor. It’s human. Then you listen to the music and get completely blown away. As a listener, your music, it’s an amazing journey. Your music has aged so well, it just gets better and better every single time. Ages ago, you posted something on your Instagram story about cooking and I found it so cool that that’s a passion of yours outside of music. Can you tell us more about that?
Tuamie: It’s no different to making music. It’s just more physical. There are more people that like spaghetti than hip-hop. I didn’t really start getting into it until I turned vegan. It’s really about flavor. My number one thing is sauce and for the past few years…I’ve been cooking tacos. Even this year, I was making nothing, but tacos. I only just started eating chicken again this year, so I make chicken tacos too. I love spaghetti. I know how to make spaghetti sauce.
Daniella: Ha! I love seeing this side to you. I always find it interesting to learn about the quirks of the people I’m inspired by, seeing the different sides outside of what people know them for.
Tuamie: Yeah, I like that too!
Daniella: So, I always see these conversations online of people, having these kind of internet wars over the words, ‘beatmaker’ and ‘music producer’. As someone who has been making music for so many years, working with the likes of Jon Bellion and Quadry, do you think a music producer and a beatmaker are interchangeable? Do you think people regard music producers more highly than beatmakers?
Tuamie: That’s a really good question. I would say a beatmaker is when you’re making a beat, being hired by someone to make beats and you can be a part of production. But, I think, when somebody says music producer, you’re thinking of Jermaine Dupri or Tricky Stewart and thinking of big records. A music producer essentially creates a production. Like yesterday, I went to Skyzoo’s house and I tried to produce a record. But, it’s hard to explain. Who’s a beatmaker that doesn’t produce? I try to look at it as, you’re a beatmaker and you’re involved in production versus the producer who is essentially the composer. I interchange producer with composer. The producer gives commands and kind of heads the artist’s music if they let them. When you and the artist are working together, sharing creative differences, then you’re a producer. There’s a lot of producers who can’t make beats. But, if you’re sending beats out to be produced later on, then you are a beatmaker. That’s my answer. I think the media creates these labels, like ‘rapper’ and ‘songwriter’. For example, Common is a rapper and songwriter. It just goes back and forth. At the moment, I’m in the transition from being a beatmaker to a producer, that I know for sure.
Daniella: I think that’s a very clear explanation actually. So, a project I LOVE of yours is Holy Ghost Spirituals v.01. When I discovered that on Bandcamp years ago, it blew me away. I love seeing producers uniquely elevate gospel records. That’s something I feel that you and Nameless do incredibly well. What inspired you to transform gospel songs in the way that you do?
Tuamie: From kindergarten to third grade, I was in Christian school. So, Christianity was my reality until I learned otherwise over the course of some years. Everything was gospel music. We went to church every day or at least three times a week. Then my teacher made us do step and in fourth grade I played the flute. I went to a Christian Academy, so that’s where that came from.
Daniella: That’s interesting insight into your early childhood. Thinking back to the first interview we did; I remember we spoke about social media and how you like to keep a low profile. Is your relationship with social media still the same as it was back then?
Tuamie: Honestly, I don’t see the purpose of using social media. Who I am talking to? It’s too much. I remember when I was 26 or 27 and I was trying to be cool on Instagram. When I unfollowed everybody, I saw a change real time. But, what does the follow mean? I’m in my sister’s boyfriend’s house right now, if I unfollow him and he has a temper tantrum about it, I’d be lost. I just don’t understand it. We’ve known each other for six years. With following on social media, it’s not about affirmation, it’s about approval. It feels like peer pressure. Now that this release [with Pete Rock and Common] just came out that’s all I’m hearing. “You need to be on social media,” but for what reason? I’ve thought about deleting or deactivating Instagram. I actually thought about getting rid of my iPhone four days ago. Social media is more physiological damage to me, than it is helping me in any realm at all.
Daniella: I appreciate your honesty. It’s valid. Ari Lennox made a post about how she’s leaving social media entirely and how being on online is detrimental to her health. Social media isn’t for everyone and that’s okay. I actually think this is part of why your music sounds so distinct, you’re drawing from a creative place that’s free from comparison, distractions and noise.
Tuamie: Thank you. I am thinking about using discord, because that’s the closest to group interaction. I’m thinking about starting a Tuamie discord and actually speaking to people.
Daniella: That would be great! Have you thought about Twitch?
Tuamie: The thing about Twitch is that people like to see your process and your life. It’s a bit too personal and taking away from the music. I would rather just focus on the music.
Daniella: That’s fair. Music is sacred to you and speaking of music…The Auditorium Vol. 1. Common and Pete Rock’s collaborative album with a song that you produced. It was only a matter of time before Common rapped on a Tuamie beat. I need ALL the details. How did this collaboration come about?
Tuamie: Yeah! So, in 2015 or 2016 I got a message from Pete Rock. I gave him the beat. It was supposed to be Nas, De La Soul and Pete Rock produced by Tuamie and with Pete Rock drums.
Daniella: Wow!
Tuamie: Yeah and that was the end of it. Then in March 2024, Pete dm’ed me again and said you’re on the album! I was like what?! I’m on an album?! That’s when I started to see the Common stuff and a month or two later, I heard the track. I was in my apartment, now mind you this was the first apartment. I moved in, in February. The only thing in the apartment was a table and the carpet. I’m there listening to the song and it really took me a while to process what was happening. It was hard for me to think about that moment. Four days ago, I woke up at 7pm and looked at my phone and saw a post on Pete Rock’s Instagram. There’s four pictures and I see, ‘For your consideration’ and my track is the ‘Best Rap Performance’ and the album for ‘Best Rap Album of the Year‘. When I woke up to see that, working and having nowhere to sleep, I was thinking what’s going on here? There’s a lot going on at once. Skyzoo actually told me that I should keep February next year open. I don’t know how to process this, but I still gotta go to work. My sister said to me ‘I only had $3 when I got my plaque’. She’s about to be famous, she has over 400,00 followers on YouTube.
Daniella: That’s impressive! What does your sister do?
Tuamie: She’s a yarn designer. She does yarn tutorials on YouTube making clothing out of yarn.
Daniella: Very cool. Such a creative family and Tuamie, I really hope you get those GRAMMYs! It’s been a great year for hip-hop. We had an LL COOL J album produced by Q-Tip. We have a Common and Pete Rock album with a beat produced by you. That’s insane. That’s inspiring. How does it feel to be a part of greatness and history in hip-hop?
Tuamie: I didn’t think it would happen. It was really never a thought. Then it actually happened, the way it did and they made a video for it. The video is such a great video and the song is great. I like the song a lot.
Daniella: Yeah, I love it too.
Tuamie: The only thing I’m telling myself is that I need to prepare for what’s to come. If what I’m being told is true, then I need to hurry up. I really have like two months to prepare for next year if that’s the case. So, how am I going to balance that? I don’t know, I’m still trying to process it. You’re hearing Common, you’re hearing someone who—all my grandmother listens to is LL Cool J or Common. And that’s really about it. And he’s on my record and having that record blasted a lot. And it’s more so that Pete Rock remade my beat that’s still wowing me. It gives me hope, because I actually wanted to quit music.
Daniella: What? Wow. Why?
Tuamie: Yeah, I was thinking about it. It’s a mix of am I making music for myself or am I making music for others? It brought that thought up more, because it gets too demanding. You’re making music and you’re having to set it up. So, it’s kind of like a form of pressure and people are holding you to a certain expectation. They need their music now and you’re not really getting anything in return instantly. It’s the same thing Skyzoo said, “if it doesn’t make you want to quit, then you haven’t really been in it.” All year it was like why am I doing this? Then the Pete Rock song comes out and it makes you question those thoughts and remember why you started in the first place.
Daniella: Wow and Eva-re-moanin came out in 2014.
Tuamie: Yeah it’s basically “every morning.” It’s actually about my mother.
Daniella: Ohhhh!
Tuamie: I made that beat about my mother, because she wakes up early morning—I made that when I was 18.
Daniella: How do you feel about that beat that you made when you were so much younger, still being prevalent now? Do you wish another beat of yours had this kind of success?
Tuamie: No actually, a beat is always going to be a beat. The first person to have it and record to it was Fresh Daily, way before the Pete Rock record. He recorded to it; it was supposed to be for his album. That was a moment in itself. Then I just gave it to Pete Rock and he reused it and got a producer to remake the beat for his album. So, it has actually been used either two or three times outside of it being released. I’m just glad it landed at all. I’m just glad that it was used at all and the money wasn’t wasted. I’ve made a lot of music in between, but that’s the one they wanted and that’s the one that everyone is hearing.
Daniella: I know how producers feel about sample mentioning or ‘snitching’, but in this instance, I’d love to look back at the history of that beat and the sample. I don’t know how protective you are over the samples in your work. So, in this case, for those who don’t know, the beat uses the keys in Joe Sample’s Voices In The Rain and the “she wakes up early every morning” in Gypsy Woman. I was curious, what made you pick that specific piano part of the Joe Sample song, at like 1:20 to remake?
Tuamie: I liked the Joe Sample record, so I was looking for something to go with the sample. I was thinking about my mom and the lyrics “she wakes up solely to do her hair and go back to sleep.” I took it and applied it to my beat, because that’s exactly what my mum does. I named it Eva-re-moanin and I named it that way, because there’s always some type of whining and complaining. *Laughs* It’s really just about my mom.
Daniella: That is actually too funny.
Tuamie: Yeah, it’s really dedicated to my mom. She loves the song too!
Daniella: It makes so much sense now. *Laughs* The way your mind works is honestly so cool. Are there any musicians, rappers, singers and even instrumentalists that you’d like to work with next?
Tuamie: I don’t have many potential collaborations, but I did go to Skyzoo’s house yesterday. I’m not sure if anything will come of that, but I’m going to work on music today and test my limit. I’d like to work with Foggie Raw again. We had a song, but it never came out. I gave it to Kooley High already. I’m trying to look into starting a production group, I’d like to work with more producers. I’d also like to work with Devin Morrison, Rapsody, MARCO PLUS and Doechii too. The biggest artist I’d like to work with is 50 Cent, that would be a dream.
Daniella: What are your hopes, dreams and plans for the future?
Tuamie: I would like to have more control of the song making process moving forward. Being able to be with the artist in person, helping them to mix elements together. Turning my music into music production that is fully produced. Making music that’s fully produced and with an artist involved, that’s what I’d love to do. I think I’m getting to that point. My hope is for more stability in music and to be able to get to a point where I can live off it. This would translate into making music easier and fun again.
Daniella: I believe without a doubt that you’ll get there Tuamie. Thank you for such a great conversation!
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