Tama Gucci returns with “Only Smoke Trees,” out now via Sinderlyn. The track is his first new single of 2023, and first taste of his latest project. The compact pop gem drops before his upcoming sets in New York and throughout Europe this spring – see dates below. “Only Smoke Trees” is a celebration of friendship and life, written during the height of the pandemic. The New York-based, Miami-raised musician, vocalist and electronic composer notes, “I was stuck in Miami and the only thing my friends and I could do was go to the beach and smoke – and smoking is also just so much better with good company! That time really made me value my life and close group of friends. We really kept each other sane during such a dark time.”

The new song comes with a video filmed on NYC’s famed Coney Island by Tama’s longtime friend and collaborator Jonathan Qualtere, who has worked with pop icons including Madonna and Beyoncé. “I wanted the video to be simple, fun and cute to really touch on that time in my life where it was just me, my friends and the beach everything was still,” notes Tama.

The artist born Kymani Floyd is a pop star of his own design, using his expansive vocal range and innovative spirit to allow us to enjoy the world through a lens that curiously explores longing and romance in the digital age. His music bridges the gap between his Jamaican identity and fascination with 90s breakbeat music and he has become a staple performer in the NYC’s emerging underground electronic queer scene.

Tama Gucci forges his own sound that uniquely reimagines the intersection of Pop and R&B. His 2021 EP Almost Blue grapples with the challenges of transitional stages while, in the same vein, insisting on remaining unfazed and optimistic about the impermanence of emotional purgatory. Simultaneously nostalgic and futurism-centered in his artistic sensibility, Tama Gucci’s music sounds like a distant memory from a rave you’ve never been to. In 2022, he released Almost Blue (After Hours Deluxe) featuring remixes of several tracks originally found on his Almost Blue EP.

Photo Courtesy: Jonathan Qualtere