Tim Atlas takes us track-by-track through his ambitious, breathtakingly bold debut album ‘Enchanté,’ a stunningly soulful and sweeping work of art that puts his dynamic, multilayered artistry – now in its tenth year – on full display.

Stream: “Enchanté” – Tim Atlas

Enchanté: It’s a standard French greeting; a term of endearment – ostensibly their way of saying, “Nice to meet you.”

And yet there’s something magical about this phrase that goes above and beyond the English language translation. It’s intimate; it’s sensual; and it’s emphatic. No wonder Tim Atlas made it the name of his debut album: A decade into his career, the Oakland-born, Brooklyn-based artist deserves a powerful reintroduction, and that’s exactly what he’s gone and done for himself. Following a breakout stint on The Voice Season 9 (with Gwen Stefani’s team), sold-out shows and festival appearances around the world, and millions of accumulated streams, Enchanté is a soulful and stunning peak behind the curtain: A sweeping work of art that puts his dynamic, multilayered artistry on full display.

Between my palms
Like an answered prayer
Slipping me an angel stare
Covering my past with a bruise
Feel something new for a night

Frequency’s not something I would buy
Charge it to my piece of mind
Slipping secrets hooked me by surprise
Just like that

Our synergy keeps it knockin
Yeah our synergy keeps it knockin

– “Knockin,” Tim Atlas

Released May 31st via Nettwerk Music Group, Enchanté is a bold, and breathtaking album that highlights Tim Atlas’ raw humanity alongside his talents as a singer/songwriter, a multi-instrumentalist, and a producer. His most ambitious project yet arrives on the heels of two sibling EPs (2023’s Le Soir and 2024’s Matinee), whose songs combine with additional tracks to express the many facets of his heart and soul.

In featuring Le Soir upon its release last year, Atwood Magazine praised it as the beginning of an exhilarating new era in Atlas’ career: “With unbridled experimentation and outside-the-box creative thinking. Atlas’ fifth EP is down-to-earth, colorful, dynamic, and varied… blending elements of R&B and neo-soul with funk, alternative, bedroom pop, and more, Le Soir is by far his most diverse offering yet,” we wrote at the time. “Tim Atlas proves he’s ready for anything and everything with an ambitiously expansive, sonically and emotionally charged collection.”

For Atlas, the goal for this, his first full-length album, was straightforward – though not at all simple.

“This album represented a new chapter in my life, and it was directly affected by my environment,” Atlas tells Atwood Magazine. “As artists, we’re always trying to tell more of our story, and I think this set of songs just sheds more light on who I am as a person. There’s also a lot of juxtaposition and switch-ups, genre-wise. Sometimes I lean into the R&B/Soul/Funk realm, and sometimes I like a little distortion on my guitars. Some songs may sound different or unlike a lot of things I’ve released, but at the end of the day, it’s just an extension of different sides of myself that people have yet to hear.”

“With my last EPs, I tried to make them a cohesive body of work. However, with this body of work, I decided to fight the urge to make all the songs fit into a tight sonic universe. They’re all still very Tim Atlas tracks, but I experimented with new genres and sonic inspiration, and I’m really happy I did because it captures a more full version of myself as an artist. However, there is always still more to the story.”

It took Atlas two long and arduous years to finish this record. “Over the course of two years, you change as a person, your influences change, and it affects the songs you want to write,” he says. “At one point, I had all these songs that felt like they weren’t meshing.”

“When we decided to split it up into two EPs — Le Soir & Matinee — that’s when I saw how cool those differences were. For Le Soir, we spent many late nights into the early morning just carving out mixes, sound designing…. And there’s sort of a delirium associated with that type of grind. Listening back to that EP, it feels nostalgic because it was unlike any creative moment for me. And Matinee is sort of the self-care-type EP. It’s the morning after, and you’re nursing yourself back to life. So those songs are a bit easier to relax to. I love the contrast between the two.”

‘Enchanté’ is basically a reintroduction to me as a human and as an artist. For me, this record represents the different corners of my music that I haven’t showcased.

Atlas thinks of Enchanté in terms of the places that inspired its songs: New York City, Paris, and California.

The album’s title came to him after he took a trip to Paris for a childhood friend’s wedding. “When I got back to NY, ‘Enchanté’ was fresh on the brain and it felt like an inspiring canvas to paint on, so I ran with it in my first writing session back,” he smiles. “I love how full circle this moment is, because the friend I saw get married (@andrewagutos) is a very talented artist and designer, and he ended up painting and designing the artwork for this album.”

Highlights abound throughout Enchanté’s thirteen songs, starting with the smoldering title track and its deep, dramatic, and all-consuming funk grooves. The bass guitar undeniably steals the show as Atlas pours his guts out, his voice hot on the mic as he sings, “Enchanté, sign my heart away. No apologies, spilling my emotions like I’m Cabernet, so don’t slip away; need your ricochet, ‘cause you two step in the corners of my mind.”

Nothing’s cheap
But I don’t want to think about that
Cause when I hear you speaking
Your vibrations take me off the map
I wanna occupy the real estate
And live in your eyes

Enchanté
Sign my heart away
No apologies
Spilling my emotions like I’m Cabernet
So don’t slip away
Need your ricochet
Cause you two step in the corners of my mind

He jumps from there into the buoyant, propulsive indie pop reverie “Sushi in Wyoming,” the tantalizing, late-night alt-R&B seduction “Attractive,” and the sweltering, in-your-face eruption “Knockin.” The dreamy “Stardust” glistens as much its namesake, and “Out Cold” is an intoxicatingly intimate slow-burn. In short, there’s no dearth of special moments – or special songs, for that matter – across this irresistibly melodic, cohesive, genre-hopping collection.

“With songs like ‘Mom’ or ‘Lighthouse,’ I tried to be lyrically vulnerable and personal,” Atlas says, choosing those two as some of his own favorites. “I was writing about experiences that were happening in real-time, so all of this pushed me to dig a little deeper and find the things that stuck for me.”

Lookin out, sun in my eyes
Docked on the west side
Runnin’ out of space and time
No sense of my design
I’m reeling in all my friends’ advice
But I don’t wanna give you up

Cause I don’t know what’s left of me
When I’m hypnotized by faces in frames
I’ll hold onto anything
After all we’ve been through

– “Lighthouse,” Tim Atlas

Meanwhile, Atlas cites the first few lines of eleventh track “As They Seem” as some of his favorite lyrics: “‘Life won’t let me hide in the stall, says the guy who thinks has it all. My best friend called me, said he’s afraid. Don’t know how to fill in the blanks.’ It’s a song about growing up and looking at that experience in hindsight. When we’re kids, we have this perception that we’ll have it all figured out by 25. And that’s just not how it works. So this is just grappling with that reality, and I think the lyrics reflect that well.”

Ultimately, Enchanté lives up to its name as an utterly enchanting introduction – and one that was well worth the wait.

Whether you’re a longtime fan or a first-time listener, it’s nice to (re-)meet Atlas; to be brought into his inner circle through song, and come as close to him as music allows.

“I think a lot of elements that define my music shine through, but there are also a lot of details in the production that I’ve never really showcased,” Atlas shares. “We’re so focused on being digestible and one thing to an audience, but I felt like that hindered the creative. So, I think this perspective was just free-falling into creativity and doing away with any idea of who I’m expected to be.”

“Sonically, I spent a lot of time tinkering in the production stages and crafting different sound design elements. I hope people hear those kinds of things on their second or third listen.”

Experience the full record via our below stream, and peek inside Tim Atlas’ Enchanté with Atwood Magazine as he takes us track-by-track through the music and lyrics of his debut album!

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:: stream/purchase Enchanté here ::

:: connect with Tim Atlas here ::

Stream: ‘Enchanté’ – Tim Atlas

:: Inside Enchanté ::

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Enchanté

Sonically inspired by Daft Punk/Parcels and written after coming back from a trip to Paris last year. An unapologetic love song about infatuation.

Sushi in Wyoming

Inspired by my road trip to move from LA to NYC, we drove across the country and stayed in random cities on the way. I literally got sushi in Wyoming because I couldn’t stand another burger, taco, rest stop cuisine situation. And even though we knew there wasn’t a body of water within several several miles, I decided to take my chances on some sushi. And so this song is basically saying that sometimes having the worst version of something is better than the alternative. Musically, I had just moved to New York and really wanted to try something different. We layered random percussion sounds (tapping on desks/acoustic guitars) & gravitated towards a 6/4 time signature. So this one represents the dimension that I craved as an artist.

Attractive

Sitting somewhere between Steve Lacy & Tame Impala, I was inspired to write a chorus that didn’t use much imagery or metaphor – just a repeating lyric as simple as the thought itself. Features real drums (played by me), glitchy production elements, but at its core, an RnB melody over a simple chord progression.

Knockin

This one has gone through several iterations, but landed in a space that feels as if Pharrell meets The Gorillaz meets Tame Impala. Distorted drums and guitars in the chorus, but the bass line over RnB chords sort of carries us through the verses. This one felt like a wink to early 2000s music.

Stardust

This one was written and recorded during a trip to Los Angeles, the track balances ethereal keys atop a distinct beat. Whenever I go back to Los Angeles, my music becomes a little more sunshiny and California poppy. It was a different interpretation. We took a psychedelic approach, and we were thinking about David Bowie.

Out Cold

Sonically somewhere between Rex Orange County & Frank Ocean, Out Cold is about having relationship anxiety because of past experiences. Riddled with trust issues and insecurity in a perfect situation. RnB/Jazz inspired arrangement with programmed 808 toms, a fat snare sample over real drums, but the vocal arrangement/harmonies is what sort of brings this into BeeGees territory.

Lighthouse

“Lighthouse” represents letting go of someone you love & remembering your relationship in a beautiful and positive light even though it didn’t work out in the end. Inspired by the funk.

The Deceiving

This one is a Psychedelic Soul number sort of about how I tend to overcomplicate a situation with pride, insecurities, and that maybe it could be much more simple than what i make it out to be. “Camouflage-ing all my inhibitions w all my vices / Circle ‘round in a field of blues when all I need is a ride in a carousel w u / So what am I to do”

Lifeboat

This one is about trying to fight the inevitable, but it starts to feel unbearable. Lifeboat is just sort of a metaphor for being stuck and sinking eventually.

Just a Baby

A last minute addition to the album. This song is about feeling like a kid around each other. Every night is a sleepover & being together means never growing up.

As They Seem

This song is about growing up & looking at that experience in hindsight. When we’re kids, we have this perception that we’ll have it all figured out by 25. And that’s just not how it works. So this song is just grappling with that reality.
(Co-written / Produced by Willy Yanez)

Mom

This one is about my mom and our rocky relationship over the last couple years.

SeeThru

“See Thru” is about the anxiety of making something of myself or being significant in the world, but most of those thoughts are a construct I’ve built up in my head as a result of my insecurities & maybe they don’t matter in the grand scheme of things. You create your own nightmares & you choose how to interpret them. Sonically inspired by Alabama Shakes/The Black Keys

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:: stream/purchase Enchanté here ::

:: connect with Tim Atlas here ::

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 © Tim Atlas
art © Andrew Agutos

Enchanté

an album by Tim Atlas