Miami’s ToBy Brings The Heat On “Play Out”

“I want people to find time to enjoy life and remember the good times that come since they’re usually so fleeting,” ToBy told American Songwriter.

ToBy — whose real name is Reggie Baril — is a Haitian-American rapper based out of Miami. On May 1st, ahead of his forthcoming EP The Outsider, ToBy dropped his single “Play Out.”  

“I had a vision of me and all my friends in a party having a great time and wanted to capture that energy in a track,” he said. “I’m also heavily influenced by New York hip-hop so I wanted to take on some of those cadences and swag over a chill lo-fi beat. I love lo-fi music a lot, I’m always binging playlists on YouTube while I work and grew up listening to a lot of Nujabes and producers who made dope sampled beats like Madlib and Dilla. I think before lo-fi hip-hop was considered a thing they were like the pioneers of that sound.”

With its familiar trap-hat rhythm, “Play Out” is a fine demonstration of ToBy’s ear for flow and production. “I recorded this song originally on my home recording rig and took the stems to my main studio to re-track the lead vocals,” he said. “The beat was part of a pack that my friend and collaborator oebeats sent me. I remember it was just like a sunny day outside and I threw the beat on to clean my room to and I was immediately like ‘nah, this has to get written today’ and dropped what I was doing to knock out the verses. My writing process is weird — it kind of feels like I just zone out and let my hands fly then regain consciousness and edit whatever happened while I was gone.”

“I’m always laying down or something thinking back about funny or crazy stuff that happened when I was in high school or college,” ToBy continued. “Running down the streets from parties that got raided or stealing a framed picture from my friend’s house and texting them pictures of it somewhere else or wrestling in the backyard off a dare. I think if you have great friends any day can be a crazy day and those are the things you’re gonna want to play out in your mind when you grow up.”

Listen to ToBy’s “Play Out” below: