Role Model: ‘I’m Not Trying to Be a Pop Star!’

T ucker Pillsbury, a.k.a. Role Model, does not enjoy being pinned down. He knows he makes pop music, but don’t call him a pop star. He’s comfortable drawing on country music — even Toby Keith — but definitely don’t call him a country artist. He’s not even sure about his own stage name, despite his growing fame under it. As he tells it, he spends most of his strong new album, Chuck Timely & The Hourglass, dodging labels, blending vintage influences from Fleetwood Mac to Stephen Bishop in search of something new.

Pillsbury recently sat down for an in-depth Rolling Stone Studio interview, discussing his secret Madonna influence, his girlfriend Dakota Johnson’s one-take cameo on “Love I You,” his nerve-wracking first day acting opposite Natalie Portman, and much more. (Watch the whole interview above or on YouTube.)

The box people try to put you in is “pop star,” and it seems like that’s not necessarily the box you wanna be in.Well, it’s tough because I do say that I make pop music, and I think as soon as you say that and you’re, like, thrown into this list of names of all these people who make pop music, all of a sudden there’s just constantly this debate of who’s going to be… who is the pop star? Who’s the pop boy right now or whatever?Main pop boy, yeah.Yeah… I just don’t want to be in that race, ’cause I’m not trying to be a pop star. And I think you can hear it in the music. Being a pop star is not interesting to me. I don’t want to do that. But I love pop music, and I love making it.

Is part of it you just don’t wanna wear the outfits?It’s the shiny outfits for me — and the background dancers.

There used to be a lane called Heartland rock — John Mellencamp, Bruce Springsteen, Tom Petty, with Jackson Browne as a kind of L.A. predecessor. I feel like that’s part of the lane you’re steering into. You and Noah Kahan are really in there right now.Yeah, everyone you just named was on the playlist and was fully referenced all throughout the album. Those are the heroes. Maybe that’s my, my… Maybe we bring back Heartland rock.

I think your team also maybe calls it lake-pop?Yeah. There’s one guy at my label, I remember him just being like, “It feels like it’s lake music, like lake pop, pontoon pop music.” I think there’s pieces of the early 2000s, like Toby Keith or whatever, and that lake Americana country, but lyrically, those songs don’t really speak to me. But sonically, I love that feeling, and so I think that was a cool thing to play with, is apply a different type of songwriting to that sonic landscape that’s usually used for beer cans and dirt roads and stuff.

You didn’t wanna write a Toby Keith, America’s-gonna-kick-your-ass song?Yeah. I’m not, I’m not sure I’m feeling that.

Your relationship with country is interesting to me. A lot of the people drawing on those references in recent years have been more in the country realm, and if a song like Sally were marketed a bit different, it’s not inconceivable you could be seen as a country artist. What are your thoughts on that?When I put out Kansas Anymore, and especially with the deluxe, I remember for the first time, like, being accepted by a lot of these country artists, and it was so cool. That was enough for me. I didn’t want to be labeled as a country artist, which is why I’m not still wearing the hat. I didn’t wear the hat at every show, and I was trying to ride a thin line, because as much as I wanted that acceptance from the country artists and that community, I didn’t want to be, like, locked off into that box.

If there’s a commonality to how you talk about your career, it’s avoiding being boxed in. You make sure the influences on any song are mixed enough that no one’s gonna say, “Oh, this is a Fleetwood Mac song.” You draw from country without being a country artist, you take on personas like Chuck, and you chose Role Model over your own name. You’re not hiding, but weary of being kept in one place.Yeah, that scares me. But I also— yes, that scares me, but it’s also a really fun thing to challenge yourself with in the studio. Me, [producers] Mason Stoops, Taylor Mackall, and everyone else that helped on the album — it was just such a battle every day of riding these thin lines and not wanting a song to lean in a certain direction too far. There are two challenges that I love. It’s one, bringing these artists that I love and applying it to pop music. I like that about pop music. It just feels like this umbrella term. It can be anything. Related Content Amidst AI-Music War, Suno Finds Another Industry Partner in BMG Role Model on His New Album, Working With Dakota Johnson <strong>—</strong> and a Possible Name Change Madonna Pays Tribute to Producer William Orbit: ‘You Were My Ray of Light’ William Orbit, Grammy-Winning Producer of Madonna’s ‘Ray of Light,’ Dead at 69

Nothing about this album is on trend for current pop — except that you pay a lot of attention to making almost every part of every song hooky, so much so that a bridge could be sliced out and work as a TikTok, which has already happened to you. Is that just songwriting craft, or has TikTok changed the way people write songs? And if so, I’m not sure that’s a bad thing. Where do you stand?As far as making anything with TikTok in mind, or clips of the song — I don’t think that in the studio. I don’t think any of us do. And if I ever did, Mason would kick my ass. That would not fly. I do try to rope people in immediately. Like, I think I have an ear for that. But as far as making things for the purpose of going viral or whatever — “Sally” was a great example. None of that was planned, all the way down to bringing people out and all that stuff. Nothing about “Sally” was planned, and I did not have any expectations for that. And so I think I learned from that you can’t plan anything, and so that makes being in the studio a lot less stressful.

When we last spoke, you were about to play Primavera — I believe your first show without the “Sally” bit. Did it feel like anything not to do it, or was it just kinda gone and nothing?I don’t think anyone cared. Aside from people coming up to me with their daughter and being like, “Can she be Sally when you play Red Rocks in the fall?” or whatever, and then I have to break the news and “I’m so sorry,” “No.” But aside from that, I don’t think anyone cared. If I didn’t believe in this album, Chuck, then I probably would’ve kept doing the Sally bit.

Doubling down, bringing three to four Sallys a night.But I don’t feel that way, and I think as much as I love the song “Sally,” it’s not… It’s a pretty low bar of a song in my mind. That was, like, a silly song with lyrically the dumbest bridge I’ve ever written.

You have a real beef with your own bridge on that. How did you end up writing a bridge you think is so dumb? Which I don’t really see the dumbness of — it’s fun.It was just, it was bridge-less for a long time, and then I went in after tour or something, and I just was like, “I think it just needs to be this loose thing. Let’s not overthink this,” and I just did that. Looking back, as much as I love that song — and I’ll always perform it till I’m done — but lyrically, that bridge is like a children’s book, so I don’t… Again, if that is the biggest part of that song, on my biggest song, it feels like a pretty low bar, to be.

At the same time, you said you were surprised it connected, in part because it’s such a Tom Petty thing. Maybe that opened the door to bring in these other influences.That was exactly it, and I already saw it with “High Hopes.” I really didn’t think people were gonna like that chorus. Also production-wise, it just had this Georgia Satellites, like, masculine—