Shortly before he opened for hit alternative pop/jazz band Ripe at Space Ballroom in Hamden, CT on November 19, 2023, I got a chance to sit down with Nathaniel Hoho, lead singer of the experimental pop group HOKO, and talk everything music and life.

Coming from a small town in Pennsylvania, Hoho started playing music when he got his first guitar at age 10. Although his first musical introductions came from musicians like The Four Tops and Michael Jackson, his guitar skills took off with his interest in bands like Nirvana and Green Day. Taking influence from bands like The Beatles and My Morning Jacket, Hoho found himself busking around colleges and playing music wherever he could while sleeping in his car. After meeting a series of people that led him to move to New York, he soon met bandmate Jesse Kotansky. 

“We were both living in Brooklyn, and we had mutual friends, there were so many artists around the scene at that point in time with actors and things, and we met at a big party at Zoe Kravitz’s apartment.”

During this time, lots of different upcoming artists and actors were crashing on Hoho’s couch including a member of the popular indie band Cage The Elephant and actor Ezra Miller, he explains, “It was a cool fun time, and we met a lot of really talented people.” 

Hoho says that the key to becoming a musician and making it in this industry is being open to working with anyone and everyone that comes your way. Here he talks about his years coming up in the music scene.

“I think when I was younger, it was easy to romanticize the lifestyle, but I feel like what has really kept me passionate about music is the love of making music and the act of making music.”

He says that if he could give his young self any piece of advice, it would simply be, “Go sit in a studio.”

After their initial meeting, Hoho and Kotansky formed their first band titled The Walking Shapes. This band had more experimental arrangements and was less focused on melody. Hoho moved to L.A. to write music for other artists and gained a newfound appreciation for pop and melody, which led to the creation of HOKO. 

In January of last year, HOKO got the chance to go to the studio of late producer Philippe Zdar and record. 

“It was amazing. I had seen an interview with Philippe, and just hearing his Ethos in music I wanted to work with him.”

Although Zdar had passed, through a connection of a friend of his, HOKO was able to go and record songs in the Motorbass studio located in Paris, France where many other bands, such as Phoenix, have got to record albums. Here Hoho discovered his newfound love of synthesizers. 

“It was a really cool experience, and I feel like for me as a student of music, there was a lot of growth.”

Looking into HOKO’s new hit single “Higher,” Hoho goes into the inspiration behind the piece.

“One night, we were working on it, and Matt Schultz, who is the singer for Cage the Elephant who was friends with Jesse, showed up at the studio to see Jesse, and we ended up talking about a friend of his who had a really intense battle with addiction, and we started talking about that, kind of guiding the lyrics around there.”

After finishing the writing and piecing together the melody, they believed they were finished, but they ended up re-recording the song in Paris.

HOKO being on its second U.S. tour, Hoho speaks on the rush of performing live.

“You never have any idea what is going to happen walking on stage, and then you kind of absorb this energy of the room, and it almost takes you over for however long you are up there, and I love that experience.” 

Performing all around the country at incredible venues and festivals such as Bonnaroo and Lollapalooza, HOKO is just getting started. 

With the relative newness of HOKO, Hoho says he wants to continue to evolve the band and be able to go wherever creativity takes him.

“I want to get to a point where if we want to put out a nine to 12-minute song, we have fans who are there for it.”

There is so much more to come. We can expect lots of new music in 2024 as the band releases singles recorded in Paris and continues to create and experiment with sound and melody.