All Ages
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MOO by KING TUFF
After Smalltown Stardust I was a bit lost. To be honest, I had been a bit lost since 2016. Both Smalltown Stardust and The Other had been departures from my “sound”, and while they were both new sonic places that I needed to explore, neither album was really all that fun when it came to performing them live. Every show I would just be looking forward to playing my older, wilder material. It was just more enjoyable to play! Loudly! So when I decided to make a new record, it only seemed right to go back to what brings me the most joy, which is, Rock & Roll music.
I got my Tascam 388 fixed, the same tape machine I had used to record my first album, King Tuff Was Dead. It had been sitting in my parent’s house in Vermont for the past 14 years, but I had finally dragged it out to LA. The first song I recorded on it was “Twisted On A Train”, and I was shocked by how instantly I sounded, and felt, like myself again. In fact, I wrote and recorded the whole dang song in the span of a few hours, which was basically the opposite of how I had been working in the computer. Spending hours moving waveforms around like a zombie, comping vocals, second guessing, trying to make things sound not lifeless, trying to make anything sound good at all, took months. But here on the tape it was so much more alive. More like painting or collaging. More like making actual music. Every move I made stuck like super glue. It was effortless. It was pure joy.
I stopped caring if there were mistakes.
There’s not enough mistakes.
I played my old, blue, Gibson SG, Jazijoo, and she spewed mangled electrified gold.
For once, I sang and I didn’t hate my voice.
I played the drums badly and bounced them in mono to one track and it sounded like glorious shit.
I wish it sounded even worse.
Rock & Roll is the music of rodents and bugs. It should sound like it crept from a decrepit trashcan or a crypt or a toilet. It is not chill or vibey, autotuned or on the grid. It is not perfect, which is why it’s perfect. And I don’t care if it’s dead or alive, cool or uncool: when I hear it, and when I play it, as a chubby and balding 43 year old punk weirdo, I FEEL ENERGIZED.
A few months before starting MOO, I fell in love. So, MOO is mostly love songs, with the exception of a song about raccoons and a song about getting an oil change. But those are actually love songs too. I suppose there’s “Stairway To Nowhere”, which is about the music industry, which I don’t love! And there’s “Delusions”, which is about thinking you’re rich and famous, but then realizing you are actually just a hoarder living in a dilapidated shack. Oh, and “Twisted On A Train” is about taking an overnight train from Tucson to LA and eating a weed gummy and freaking the fuck out and staying up all night in the observation car writing the lyrics to “Twisted On A Train”.
MOO would turn out to be the last music I made as a resident of LA. I had been thinking of leaving for awhile, and a number of things finally sent me on my way. I moved back to Vermont and it’s been wonderful. The lyrics, and obviously the title, started to make a lot more sense once I got back east. It was like the world had been shouting “MOO” at me for years, and I finally listened.
All in all, MOO is a full circle moment. A return to form. A return to rock. A return to Vermont. A return to myself.
Reconnecting the dots. Restarting the engine. Plugging in the stack. Finally letting King Tuff be King. Fucking. Tuff.
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Now please enjoy this poem which further highlights the various uses and features of MOO:
MOO by KING TUFF is an album that’s new
A MOO of pure joy, an album called MOO
MOO means I love you, in the language of Cow
I MOO when I see you, I’m MOOing right now
I MOO when I miss you, MOO when I dream
MOO when I’m with you, will you MOO for me?
A personal motto, a general rule
For any occasion, a MOO multitool
MOO in the morning, MOO in your car
MOO like a madman, and wish on a star
MOO when you’re happy, or if you’ve got the flu
MOO isn’t boring, that’s why it’s MOO
MOO is a record, an energy stew
MOO is forever, an infinite MOO
MOO calls your landline, and makes you miss home
MOO makes you mutate straight into a gnome
MOO with your lover, MOO like a freak
MOO at the movies, MOO ‘tween the sheets
The past couple years were a little less MOO
A little more tender, a little more blue
But MOO, it turns out, is like riding a bike
Once you learn how, you can MOO your whole life
So when it came time to sing a new song
The MOO that emerged was steady and strong
MOO on my 8 track, MOO on the tape
MOO like Was Dead, Tascam 388
20 years later, a beauMOOtiful sound
Guitars with phaser, and MOOs all around
MOO out on LP, CD and cassette
MOO on your boombox, best KING TUFF yet
MOO made in LA, twenty-twenty-four
A house in Mt. Washington, ‘pon the second floor
Produced by myself, and engineered too
I played most of the instruments, made all of them MOO
And after years of confusion I felt like myself again
MOO made the conclusion that I was an elf again
Now back in Vermont, we all speak in MOO
You can MOO all you want, that can be all you do
MOO for the maple, straight from the tree
MOO in the stable, MOO to be free
For sometimes you just have to MOO for no reason
Yes, a MOO is in order for every season
What else can I say? Nothing but MOO
MOO is myself, MOO is my truth
So MOO if you want, and take a big puff
And thank you for listening, to MOO by KING TUFF.
-King Tuff, 2026
