Role Model’s New Persona Is Basically Forrest Gump

His name’s Chuck Timely, and life’s like an album rollout, you never know what you’re going to get. Role Model is embracing his new musical persona in his upcoming album, Chuck Timely & The Hourglass, and he already has Chuck’s lore locked down. “We talk about him as a time traveler. This weird dude who was just for some reason in the background of all those studio sessions. We talk about Chuck every single day in the studio, and it was the most fun part, honestly,” Role Model told Rolling Stone in a new interview. “Once the songs were written, all we did was talk about Chuck. We made up all these stories. I feel he was always in the background of photos with Michael Jackson for some reason, but also weirdly knows Olivia Rodrigo and has been through this journey through the decades.” Essentially, Chuck Timely is a vehicle for Role Model to explore his favorite parts of different eras of music.

As for who Mr. Timely’s going to be inspired by, Role Model has many musicians in mind. Bruce Hornsby, Bruce Springsteen, and Fleetwood Mac are some of the artists he named. But one pop queen has him obsessed. “I love Madonna, and I had a weird obsession with her. Trying to apply the danciness of ’80s synth-pop music without using synths was another thing that I did on the record,” he explained. “I just had a rule of no synths on the record. And so that was a challenge. We tried to really learn from the Madonna stuff and see how we could apply what she was doing within our soundscape.” Maybe somewhere in Chuck Lively’s lifetime, he had a relationship with Madonna, and she left him with a new love of synths. Add it to his personal life page on Wikipedia!