Bang That Tub :: Tom Goss on Being a "Cover" Boy

Openly gay singer-songwriter Tom Goss has been a rising star on the music scene for a few years now, producing a slate of CDs full of his own original material and also taking to YouTube with videos for his cover versions of other artists' songs.

That's been particularly true of late, with the songster offering his take on Taylor Swift's "Shake It Off," Iggy Azelea's "Fancy," and -- in a video released just last week -- a bouncy retro version of "All About That Bass."

EDGE gave Goss a quick ring to chat about his cavalcade of covers, his upcoming video for a song from his latest CD, and that murder mystery movie he was in earlier in the year.

EDGE: You've done a spate of covers recently, exploring different styles and sounds. Have these covers been a kind of "palate cleansing" experience before you start digging into material for your next CD?

Tom Goss: Maybe... I've never thought about it like that. I think it's just fun - it's fun to take something that's well-known and popular and turn that on its head. As an artist, I'm always trying to create. Doing covers provides more opportunity to create.

EDGE: I was amazed at the trashcan version of Taylor Swift's "Shake It Off" that you made with Jeb Havens. What was the story there?

Tom Goss: I really love that song. I had been thinking about that song; I knew I had to cover that song because it's so fun. I never want to be doing the same thing everybody else is doing out there, like with the guy sitting and doing the cover with a guitar. You can have a great band a good voice and everything but for me it still might be a little boring, because it's expected.

So I was listening to the song on repeat and thinking about what the predominant sounds were and how I could get those sounds, without faking it. It'd be easy to use a drum loop and use a big bass drum and a side stick and duplicate that sound, but I think it's more interesting when you find things that are similar to the sound. What I was going to use was a 5-gallon bucket, because it gives you that big, big boom and that click as well, but when I got to Los Angeles and I got to the house where I was staying, I parked the car and was walking to the house and I saw that great big trash can, and I thought, 'Well, that's way better! And it's majorly way more interesting.' So then I spent the night hitting the trash can and seeing how I could hit the trash can in the way that sounds the best.

EDGE: How'd you end up getting Jeb Havens involved?

Tom Goss: I love Jeb, we've been playing together for years, back when he was up in San Francisco. Really I just texted him and asked him if he knew the song. He told me he loved it and we were off to the races.

EDGE: Any response from Taylor Swift? Or from any of the artists whose songs you've covered?

Tom Goss: Naw, but I definitely tweeted her and all of her fan pages. Iggy Azalea favorited Mike's (my husband) tweet to her about it. Then went on favoriting a bunch of my tweets, but she never re-tweeted. No such luck yet!

EDGE: That's a very fun video. You've done some very simple, straightforward videos where you might be in a room someplace, standing at a mike, singing into the camera - like the cover of Macklemore & Ryan Lewis' "Can't Hold Us." But then you've also done some much more involved stuff, like the video where you cover Iggy Azelea's "Fancy," and you have, like, four characters in a variety of colorful settings.

Tom Goss: That one looks complicated, but it probably took the least amount of time of all the shoots. We knew we wanted to do something fun and colorful, and my friend and director said that he knew a place where there was a bunch of graffiti in an alley. He didn't know exactly where that place was, so we drove around in circles for a little while, and then once we found it we shot it. All those shots are five feet away from each other. They're all in the same location, but if you just turn the camera you get something else interesting. I went to a thrift shop, spent $40 on silly outfits, and then we drove over to this alley and shot it - it took maybe 90 minutes. That was a really fun one.

EDGE: That brings us to the new video you've done with MDG, "All About That Bass," which is again extremely fun and colorful - and here you're using a green screen, you're got all these psychedelic backgrounds, and some interesting editing and visual effects! How did all that come together?

Tom Goss: Again, I just really loved the song. Once I heard the song it was obvious that it was really something I should cover. That being said, it wasn't something I thought I should be singing. That wouldn't make any sense. The song is all about the perspective of someone who is bigger, and I'm not bigger, so I thought it would be really interesting to enlist someone who was bigger.

Then I thought what would be even more fun would be to get a drag queen. It kind of evolved from there in my head, and Michael -- MDQ -- who's been the makeup artist on our videos for years, I knew that he could sing, but honestly I didn't know if he did drag. So I texted him and asked if he did drag, and he said, 'Yeah, I do drag sometimes.' I pitched this idea to him, and he was really into it. We had a really fun time recording it.

When we shot it, there was another video already scheduled. I'm not going to tell you it was a light shoot schedule, but it was lighter than we usually have, and so I thought, 'Why don't we shoot two videos at the same time, as long as we have this green screen set up, as long as we're doing all this work - why don't we stick people in front of it and let them act the fool and see what happens?' So we shot the music video for "Wait," which hasn't been released yet, and "All About That Bass" at the same time.

EDGE: When does the video for "Wait" come out?

Tom Goss: Some time around January. I'm finishing up the editing, but there's a couple of other videos in the hopper that have to come out before that, so it's looking like it's delayed until January - which is a bummer, but it'll come out [in due time]. It's really fun.

EDGE: You are keeping busy!

Tom Goss: [laughing] Ya gotta work, you know!

EDGE: Your videos do some snappy, inventive things with editing. Who's the fount of inspiration for this? Do you have an editor you tend to work with, or are these ideas that spice up your videos something you come up with yourself?

Tom Goss: I've worked with a bunch of folks, and have done a lot on my own. It just depends. I've worked a lot with a great team in DC called District Lights, we have cooked up a lot of kooky ideas.

EDGE: You were just saying you wanted someone bigger for "All About That Bass," and it's a song that presents a body-positive message, counteracts the body shaming messages we're bombarded with... and also, I think, dovetails with the trend of how women want to have bigger booties. There was just an Associated Press story about how women are looking to get more junk in the trunk.

Tom Goss: Yeah, Kim Kardashian, J. Lo... it's never been something that wasn't happening, but it's definitely becoming more and more popular.

EDGE: Were you looking to tap into that bigger bootie frenzy?

Tom Goss: No, not necessarily... but that's not a bad idea. Maybe I should!

[laughter]

EDGE: You brought some new sounds and new styles to your music with the songs on "Wait," and your newest videos are really delving into all sorts of different sounds. Are those different styles and approaches leaking into your creative process as you continue writing original material?

Tom Goss: I'm always experimenting with different sounds, I don't know... there's obviously a yes to that; the things I'm listening to absolutely influence my writing style. I'm writing a couple of different projects now, so it's a little different than usual. It's not like my writing style has been exactly like it has been in the past - everything I'm listening to sneaks into what I'm doing. So the answer is yes, but I don't know. Is that even an answer?

[laugher]

EDGE: I know you are very prolific; you have a million ideas all the time; once you have an idea worked out, you sit down and start playing, and twenty minutes later you have a new song. So I'm sure you already have a bunch of new songs you're playing with for whatever you're planning to do next.

Tom Goss: Yeah, that's true, and the two big projects I'm working on now are collaborative projects, so I'm writing with other people. So I guess when I think about the evolution of the current state of my songwriting, I think the people I'm writing with are more influential on me right now than the stuff I am listening to... I think I'm always wanting to write better music. When there's a really good, well-constructed pop song, I'm always wondering what makes it so good, and how can I be better at doing that?

EDGE: Can you say anything about your two collaborative projects? Are you writing stage musicals or something?

Tom Goss: Well I've got two projects, both musicals, one for stage and one for screen. They're both in very early stages so not quite in "talking about" phase, but I'm happy with how they're developing!

EDGE: You've had a few months now since releasing "Wait," and you've done quite a lot of touring of that material. With the passage of time and the experience of the tour, are you looking back at that project - which you deliberately slowed down and let develop more slowly than your usual album - and getting fresh perspective on it? Are those songs continuing to evolve for you even now?

Tom Goss: The songs always change as they're played on the road. It's not that they become different songs; it's the way that you play them or the way that you sing them, that's what is always evolving. I'm feeling artistically satisfied by "Wait."

I think in my other projects, when the project finished I immediately realized that I could do better; I didn't like X, Y, or Z think that I did, so I was striving to be better [for the next project]. With "Wait," I really feel content; I feel like I did what I set out to do, so I don't have that lingering sense of unaccomplishment. I'm not rushing to create a whole new catalogue of songs, I'm not rushing to get back into the studio. I'm seeing what else is in store.

EDGE: So you're waiting a little bit longer.

[laugher]

Tom Goss: It's sad that in [the music business] almost as soon as a record is done, it becomes old. I'm not ready for this project to be old quite yet.

EDGE: How about the other side of your burgeoning career? You were in a movie recently, Rob Williams' new gay-themed murder mystery "Out to Kill." What's the status with that? Is it headed to DVD soon?

Tom Goss: It's out on DVD on December 9, and should be streaming at that point too, but we're waiting on final confirmation.

EDGE: How are you feeling about that artistic experience? Was that also extremely fulfilling, or are you now looking back and saying, "I could have done that differently, I could have made a different choice there and there," and filing those notes to yourself away for next time?

Tom Goss: More than anything, it was a learning experience. It was something I had never done, and it was something I just didn't know if I could do it or not. I learned that, yeah, this is interesting and fun and I'd like to explore this a little more. The learning has just begun; there's exponential growth when it comes to acting, because it's something I just haven't explored that much.

EDGE: Doing more and more with videos must give you more of a sense of familiarity with the camera, and also learning how to be in character, step out of and get back into character.

Tom Goss: Absolutely, and I can see it what I'm doing. I'm exploring different characters. It's like, "Okay, that is what I'm doing here." I never thought of myself as an actor per se, but I am definitely acting in the videos. I can see why people think of me as an actor.

EDGE: You play three different characters in the one video alone, in "Fancy!"

Tom Goss: You're absolutely right! It's about having fun, but now I am thinking about all of that differently. I'm learning how to make it all a little more intentional.

Keep up with Tom Goss at http://tomgossmusic.net