by Daniel Colussi | King Tuff is the nome de plume of LA-via-Battleboro,Vermont rocker Kyle Thomas. Thomas has done time in many fine bands of various styles over the years but he’s at his best when he straps on his LA Dodgers baseball hat with the earflaps and plays the scrappy pop music of King Tuff.

King Tuff is a delight of rollicking bubblegum glam pop, and his two albums are very effective blasts of catchy three minute gems. Upon hearing that Thomas would finally be making his virginal appearance in Vancouver to support his new Sub Pop album I knew I had to talk with him. I reached him by phone as he sat in one of LA’s many sunbaked parking lots. Have you ever noticed while talking to someone on the phone that you can detect when that person is smiling? Such was the case with Thomas, who seemed to be permanently bemused and entertained. His phone disposition was attentive but laid back, which is never a bad way to be. Enjoy our exchange…

Kyle? This is Dan from Scout Magazine in Vancouver. (Pause) Hi Dan!

Were you expecting this call or is this a total surprise to you? No, I knew.

Ok. Because sometimes when I do this the person has no idea that there’s going to be an interview and then it’s awkward. (Laughs) No, I am ready. I am so ready. I’m in LA right now, sitting in a hot parking lot as usual.

Is that home for you right now? Parking lots are always home (laughs). Yeah, I live in LA now. It’s great.

So you’re playing Vancouver at the end of July and I know that you’ve had different people over the years serving as a backing band. Who’ll be your band in Vancouver? I’m not sure who’s going to be playing on the tour yet actually (laughs). Um, I think it’ll be Magic Jake on the bass, this kid Matthew from Audacity on guitar…not sure who’s playing drums on that tour yet.

Do you like touring? Yeah. I mean, it’s definitely got its ups and downs but for the most part I like it. I like seeing friends all over the place and eating all kinds of weird food, staying at weird people’s houses. It’s a lot of driving though. Pretty boring.

What kind of road tunes do you favour on those long drives? I like the radio. I like pop radio. Top Forty. Or a lot of times I just like listening to nothing. Or if people are listening to something annoying then I’ll put on headphones and just listen to The Beatles.

So this new album, King Tuff, has been in the can for a year. Why so long to get it out? I recorded it almost a year ago, in July. And then it got mixed for about four months. All of the music was done and all the mixing was done in December. So it’s been quite a while. The worst part about putting out records is that it takes a long amount of time. By the time it comes out you’re already sick of it.

I know you’re a prolific writer. What stuff are you going to play in this tour? New stuff, or stick to the two albums? Yeah. It’s mostly stuff from the two albums. We’re in the process of learning the songs from the new one so that’s exciting to play those songs live for the first time and figure them out. I have a lot of other songs that aren’t on records that would be cool to learn and eventually start playing them live. But I figure I might as well play the songs that people know.

So you’ve written a lot of songs, and with both albums there were significant gaps between when they were recorded and their release. The first album, I recorded it in 2006 and it came out in 2008, but I actually wrote most of the songs in 2001.

So you recorded the new album with Bobby Harlow of little known but cultishly revered band The Go, who at one time counted Jack White among their membership. How’d that come about? We met through Burger Records because they released some Go stuff and stuff from Bobby’s other band, A Conspiracy Of Owls. So we met at a Burger show at SXSW. I’d never heard The Go at that point but I had a Conspiracy Of Owls record and I liked it, so I just kind of mentioned to him that maybe we should do something together. I didn’t know what it was. I just felt like we should do something together when I met him. And then I got a call from him saying he would produce my album. I didn’t even know he was a producer. But then after that I started listening to all his recordings and they just all sounded really great. So I went with him.

Your first album you did completely on your own. What was it like working with Bobby? Was he calling the shots? Yeah, yeah. I pretty much gave up total control. He chose the songs we were gonna record. He kind of did some arranging on them. He brought in a bass player and a drummer. I was just there playing the guitar and singing, and not doing anything else. I didn’t have a hand in the mixing at all. It was definitely really scary and really hard for me because I am used to just doing everything myself and getting exactly what I want. But I wanted to challenge myself to see if I could work with someone else.

These songs on these two albums were written years apart. Did you approach to writing songs change? Um, no. I mean, I’ve always kind of written lots of songs in different styles. So the demos I gave Bobby had a lot of different kinds of flavours in there and you know at first I was kind of shocked that he chose some of the lighter songs because I was thinking about making a full-on rock album, but he really pushed to have those different kinds of softer songs. Which I think is cool. I was definitely fighting against that when he was rooting for those songs, but I think it’s cool now.

So what makes a good pop tune in your mind? I come at it from a real classic writing style of super compact, making sure nothing is too long, that the song is exciting the whole time. And you know, bringing stuff in and out, making sure there isn’t too much happening at once. And lyrically having something that people can connect to, but at the same time twisting it so that its a little bit weird. Adding my own touch to it, I guess. I’m really into comic books and oddball shit, so there’s always that kind of flavour sprinkled in there.

Your songs definitely have a distinct vibe, musically and lyrically. Some of the themes seem idiosyncratic to your music, celebrating certain themes that are unique. I’ve actually tried to write things super straight and normal and I just get real bored. I’ll put something kind of strange in there by accident. And a lot of times I don’t even think something’s weird and other people are like, “that’s totally weird” (laughs).

Nu Sensae, Jaill and King Tuff play the Biltmore Sat. July 21st. Tickets at The Biltmore, Zulu and Red Cat.

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Zulu Records veteran and tunage aficionado Daniel Colussi is the Music Editor of Scout Magazine.