Steve Lacy has shared a few of his biggest influences, with some surprising additions.

In an interview with The Guardian, the “Bad Habits” crooner said his genre-blending heard on Gemini Rights came from various indie rock and pop punk influences.

“I’ve always loved doing that — if I have a rocky beat, putting a soulful melody on it. Like ‘Dark Red’ and all those types of songs. It’s a way to play and introduce new ideas into things that we know already.”

He continued, “Growing up playing [the video game] Guitar Hero put me on to a lot of rock and guitar music. As I got older, artists such as Paramore raised me. Mac DeMarco, Dirty Projectors, Vampire Weekend. Even Weezer’s ‘Undone’ is one of my favorite songs ever.”

 

He added that Paramore’s Hayley Williams also had a serious impact on him growing.

“Hayley’s voice and melodies are crazy because she takes the rock thing and makes it soulful,” Lacy said, adding that he specifically loved Weezer’s “wit” and “humor.”

“The dissonance of the chord progression of ‘Undone’ is truly just weird. For something like that to exist was super important for me in my musical journey, to be, like: ‘Oh, wow, you can make this sound fun and dope.”

Lacy also mentioned the folk singer Faye Webster, as well as late legends like Prince and Jimi Hendrix.

“When I make music, I take a small piece of everything that I love – I’ll take certain melodic approaches from Prince, but I’ll play it as if someone else was mimicking Prince, like if Jimi Hendrix tried to be Prince,” he said. “But I like to mix different approaches together. It happens naturally. I’m never doing it all purposely. It’s just inside of me.”

Lacy’s latest album Gemini Rights is still being thoroughly enjoyed by his fans. The project debuted at No. 7 on the Billboard 200 with 34,000 first-week units, and his single “Bad Habit” peaked at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 earlier this year.

In a previous interview with GQ, Lacy discussed how his latest work marked a real turning point in his creativity, mostly because he was able to transition from his laptop to a real studio.

“Part of it was deleting old processes, and trying out new shit,” he told GQ. “Other people could bring me texture that I couldn’t do for myself. Before, I wanted to have more people on there because I didn’t know what to do for myself. But the more I started to collaborate, the more I did see, Oh, okay. I do have it.”

Kanye has remained one of Steve Lacy’s staunchest supporters through it all and gave the singer some serious praise earlier this year when Gemini Rights dropped.

“Album is beautiful,” Ye – a fellow Gemini – commented on Lacy’s album announcement. “One of the most inspiring people on the planet.”