kuru.
Sandy Ha. via publicist.
Looking back, kuru says his life was kind of a mess when he was recording his last album re:wired. After graduating from high school in 2022, the Maryland native briefly attended college in Nashville while working on his full-length debut, but couldn’t quite adapt to an unfamiliar recording setup. Plus, the teenage rapper was still processing the aftershocks of the pandemic.
“I was just kind of on some “shit, we're doomed” type of mentality. I feel like I spent so long in quarantine, I didn’t remember who I was before that,” kuru tells me at The FADER offices on a sunny Friday near the end of May. “I don't wanna call it psychosis— but it was this weird cyber-like mental stasis type ordeal, and I feel like that was the whole theme of re:wired, my life getting out of that.”
His latest album Backstage hologram is the result of becoming more “comfortable” with his music, deftly corralling disparate influences from jerk rap, J-Pop, DMV hip-hop, and more. Building on the tighter songwriting of 2025’s Stay true forever and his ongoing association with the Too Many Strikers crew, kuru’s electronic-inflected raps have never hit harder. From the polygenre synthesis of “Three worlds apart” to the dialed-in flows of “FW19,” which kuru recorded and re-recorded until every bar sounded just right, Backstage hologram pushes the Rockville rapper’s sound to delirious new heights.
The FADER talked to kuru about Too Many Strikers, Backstage hologram, and why he hates when his music is labeled digicore.
The FADER: You’ve been on a pretty long tour with Lucy Bedroque. How’d that go?
kuru: I really enjoyed it. The Atlanta show was crazy, but I never expected people to be biting each other. I didn't think that would be like a real talking point that I'd ever have. And the feds came like midway during my set— I had no idea— but apparently there were police.
It was just a lot to think about. I was in the green room talking to Quinn like, “What the fuck is going on?” But overall, the tour felt great. Nine [9Lives] and Lucy are my friends, so it doesn't feel like a weird business interaction.
I wanted to ask about “FW19,” one of the singles from the project. Can you talk to me a little bit about how that song came together?
It felt really great to drop after “two,” cause I definitely don't wanna be a jerk rapper in any way, shape or form. The sound is awesome, but my friends can do that shit way better than me so I have respect for the homies. My friend Bhertuy had sent me the beat really randomly and the way the kicks are mixed on that beat just felt so perfect to me. It is the most Ableton ass beat I've ever heard in my life, so I was just like, “OK, I'm just gonna punch this out and then we're just gonna go for it.” Sometimes you just hear something, and it's like, “oh, I already know how this is gonna go.”
Was there any song on Backstage hologram that was especially hard or took a longer time to finish?
Probably “Like glue,” because making complex instrumentals is kind of a pain in the ass and also, I love Katmoji to death, she's so awesome, but mixing her vocals... There was a fan in the back that was really tweaking me out and it took like six hours cutting this shit out take for take, but I can't blame her for it.
That was the only one that was a pain. But I really fuck with the way that song came out. Honestly, I feel like all the songs that sound like they would have taken longer probably took the shortest. Like “Three worlds apart” did not take long at all, even though that's the longest song on the whole album, and I would say arguably probably the most complicated.
I feel like the songs that took the longest were probably “FW19” because I really wanted to hone in every single take because I was re-recording and re-recording and re-recording it. All of them kind of felt a little seamless except “Like glue” and “FW19.”
Sandy Ha.
Were you producing on this record?
It's a weird pocket because I wanted to self-produce most of it, but the only one’s that fully self-produced is literally just “Like glue.” There's a lot of like me touches on [the album] though. Actually the really funny shit is “End of Spring” and “Noir kei” are the exact same melody, and it's just a file that I've had on my laptop since 2022. It's a four year old melody that I just never fucking touched ever, and I sent it to both Jayysoul and sean baby, and they just both sent me fire beats. And they sounded different enough to where I think I could get away with it and like no one's noticed yet, so I think it's really funny.
Could you talk to me a little bit about what your recording process is like?
I need a pack of Velveeta crackers. I need a Diet Coke. I need a glass of tea, no honey, and it has to be Jasmine green— if I can find it. But everything was done at home. I haven't really started recording in the studios until recently, so mainly I just brew myself a cup of tea, and I just sit there and I eat crackers and I'm just like, “OK, I'm just gonna punch this in, I'm just gonna punch that in.” Writing for me is weird because I like punching in parts. Sometimes I'll write a hook and then I'll punch in the rest, or I'll punch in the hook and then I'll write a verse. But usually most of these were punch-ins. I think the only thing that was freestyled was “I can live w that.” That was like entirely one take and then we had to cut it up and then do it in pieces because it was too cluttered.
One thing that was interesting to me about Backstage hologram versus your previous records is that your rapping had gotten a lot tighter. From an outside perspective, it felt like you'd been running around with Jaeychino and them for so long some of that was rubbing off on your process.
Hell yeah, those are the guys. Of course they inspire me a lot. I feel like with a lot of TMS shit I'm working prod side; I wanna have a lot of them on the next shit that I'm working on, I just haven't really had that much time to record with them because, you know, we just don't really be in the same cities a lot.
But, you know, those are the guys. It makes me happy just from a DMV perspective. They inspire me a lot. I hope I inspire the next group of kids trying to be producers out there, trying to do shit like that.
When you think about your raps now versus a few years ago or even like maybe earlier when you were starting to make music, like where do you feel like you've grown the most as a lyricist or a vocalist.
I definitely feel like I've grown a lot in the flows. Even before COVID, let's say the hyperpop, digicore shit, I wasn't really listening to that shit, bro. I was listening to fucking Goonew and Migo Lee. And if there's literally one rapper that I've listened to since I started making music, it was Lil Xelly. That's the king of Rockville. It kind of just all kind of comes back to him. A lot of my current flow to this day, was inspired by him. Even before Chino and all them— but I'm not gonna sit there and act like Chino and Drag [Dragnutz] don't inspire a lot of the vocal work, they're great. The influence was always there. I was just never using it because I was just caught up in some other bullshit that I didn't want to make.
When and how did you link up with the TooManyStrikers guys?
I mean, I had known SJ [sjr] probably since COVID days. So I mean, it was really SJ, Migo Lee, and there were a couple of times where me and Migo Lee made music, and that was really fun. I miss that guy a lot, free him. Very, very cool dude.
But yeah, after that I was already talking to SJ and twentythree a little bit, and then Jody got wrapped up into the mix, and then like after that it was like Chino, all them. There's a lot of people that came in later like Drag. Yeah, I was kind of there when TMS kind of just started, so I was like, “fuck it, like let's do it.”
I wanna come down there more often and visit, it's just sometimes I get a little too caught up in this life shit because my head is all over the place. It's not really like too much of a disconnect though, because like they're still in New York like for shows and shit, and there was a period of time where SJ was like staying up here, so like then Drag and killjae would always be up here.
I know at one point you had [said], you know, “don't call my shit digicore.” Could you expand on that a little bit?
Bro, it's fucking stupid. I understand what you mean cause I was there for that era, and I guess could argue that I was probably one of the bigger figures, but it just doesn't suit me as a descriptor. It is “internet,” but I like being outside with people in real life. I'm not that digital. Maybe during that time frame I was, but... It doesn't feel right. I don't even think the sound fits it. When I think digicore, I think like old d0llywood1 beats, I think old Vinso beats, I think shit like that.
You really just got some big 808s and some internet vibes.
I really feel we're all on the internet, I feel it just kind of comes down to some Japanese shit. At the end of the day, I feel like a lot of my sound really comes to that because it's like a lot of my melody inspirations. I think Camellia, Snails House, Chocho, old Hikaru Utada. Like I don't think about fucking – respectfully – 2022 COVID.
Old Perfume, old Capsule, that's where my swag is from when it comes to that melodic pocket. The rest of the rap shit at this point is just a mixture of DMV flows. So I could see why people think it's like digicore cause a lot of the digicore shit was kind of inspired by the Perfumes and the Capsules of the world. But I hate it when I'm very clearly rapping my ass off and they're like “this is digicore.” I hate it when someone calls “Like glue” digicore. I'm just like, “bro, that is literally just a J-pop-ass song.” Maybe I complain too much, but I feel like my qualms are justified in this case.
Sandy Ha.
