A Melting Pot of Culture with GTA

Hailing from Latin households in Miami, with eclectic cultural and musical backgrounds, Matt Toth and Julio Mieja, better known as GTA, have been carrying the torch for a movement they call “death2genres.” Dabbling in anything and everything from rock to hip-hop to R&B, their craft is sleek, sexy, and in-your-face.

Intro and Transcription by Andy Gorel

Interview and Photography by Mike Greene

Mike: How did growing up in Miami, and the genres of music surrounding you affect the way you produce today?

Matt: I’d say my parents, my friends, and everyone I was surrounded by was really open to all kinds of music, and coming from a Latino background, my grandparents would play vinyls of stuff like Salsa and Merengue. It was big in Miami since pretty much everyone is Latino down there. That’s a huge thing on the radio. They play all kinds of hip-hop, and all that stuff. I think it was a huge melting pot of cultures, as well as American cultures obviously.

Mike: Was there any type of underground Latino music scene that you were a part of?

Matt: Not really. Like Reggaeton and stuff like that is huge in the Latino culture. Salsa, Merengue, Latin Jazz, all that stuff. Julio played trumpet and he was in a Salsa band, and a Latin Jazz band, so I’m sure all of that had huge influences with him, but a lot of it was just being exposed to all the different genres, being able to hear them, and us just automatically liking them, and being ok with them.

Mike: Do you feel that the Latino background, or playing trumpet is reflected in the music you create today?

Julio: I think everyone is starting to gain influences from all kinds of genres, not even just the Latin side, but everything. I think as far as our music goes, it has definitely inspired it for sure. I love Latin Jazz. I love Latin music period. Matt Loves Latin music too, so we definitely incorporate that as one of the major other influences in our music.

Matt: Just the sound of Brass instruments, like in “Intoxicated” we use a horn. In “Goons” – we just released that one – we use a horn. We had made that song like three years ago. So it definitely plays a huge role in what we do.

Mike: Was there anyone that your parents listened to specifically that they would play over and over again?

Matt: Not really. They listened to a lot of different stuff, which I guess is what rubbed me to listen to everything. They were pretty eclectic in their musical tastes. Even though my family isn’t a musical or artistic kind of family, they were just really into music. I guess just listening to all of these different sounds and rhythms – I pretty much got my taste from them. My cousin’s father as well was really open to showing me every kind of music he could.

Mike: What about your cousin’s father?

Matt: He was just into everything – everything. He would dive deep into picking up vinyls and records, just trying to find music really. He really just loved music, and he would always show me and my cousin, whether it be Classic Rock or Latin Jazz or Salsa, or even Hip-Hop, he would just listen to everything.

Mike: Julio, what about you? Was there anyone in your life, like his uncle?

Julio: I would definitely say my uncle and my dad. Both of them listened to all kinds of music. My dad was more of the traditional, Latin, Salsa, Merengue, whatever, and then my uncle knew a lot about House music, which surprisingly enough, I found out a few months ago that he actually went to Ultra.

Mike: Your uncle?

Julio: Yeah! It’s crazy. He’s been there. But he would tell me about Paul Van Dyke, and a bunch of artists. He has towers of CDs of just mixes and stuff like that. He would show me them, but I wouldn’t really be interested as a kid. Now I understand, it’s cool though. Both of us definitely have family members that inspire all kinds of different music. Cause growing up in a Latin household in Miami, Florida, I heard all kinds of music all the time.

“Being popular is one thing, but making something original is another”

Mike: Would you say they were fully supportive of your push into music? Were they the ones who kind of helped you get to where you are?

Matt: I wouldn’t necessarily say that. They were definitely supportive of, “Oh, you like music and you’re making music, that’s cool,” but they probably didn’t ever see it like a career choice. They were always pushing for school. Always pushing to stick to the kind of normal route, as far as a career. Obviously as soon as I was able to show that I can make a living off of this, they were like “Shit, man. If you can do it. Go for it.” Definitely in the beginning they were supportive like “Cool, you like music. But go study,” and shit.

Mike: An artist’s music is typically a reflection of themselves in one way or another. What does your music say about you guys?

Matt: It says that I like energy, and jumping around, and loud noises, and screaming I guess.

Julio: I feel like since our kind of style has always been “death to genres,” which just means be open-minded. I feel like both of us are just open-minded, especially for music, but in every other aspect in life, it’s always good to expose yourself to, and try new things. I feel like at this age – we’re both 24/25 – it’s important to do that. So I feel like a lot of the reason why our music is like everywhere is cause we’re like that in our lives.

Matt: I’d also say we don’t like to overthink a lot of things. A lot of our songs can be very simple, but at the same time kind of intricate. Still, for the most part very simple. So I feel, just go and get lost in it. Don’t overthink anything. Whenever you overthink things, I feel like it gets too complicated. So I feel like a lot of the time, we take that mentality with our music, and with our lives as well.

Mike: Do you guys feel since you don’t necessarily associate yourselves with one genre, you’re able to experiment more, and exit that comfort zone?

Matt: Yeah, definitely. That’s one of the reasons we incorporated this whole “death to genres” thing. It’s how we’ve been thinking from the beginning. We’ve never really had the opportunity, I don’t even know if I would call it an opportunity really, but we’ve never had the moment where we had to go and pigeonhole ourselves because people were telling us to. We’ve had people try to tell us to, and we were like “Fuck that. Why am I gonna stop myself from experimenting?” Which is why we do the “death to genres” thing, and we’ve always just said “Fuck it. I wanna make music that I love. That’s the reason I got into this, why not keep going with it?” And we’ve been lucky enough to have been able to push it enough to where that’s what people expect now. That’s like our brand.

Mike: Do you feel that today’s music has become so saturated with all of these genres, that it’s where “death to genres” stems from?

Julio: I feel like it stems more from people just trying to do the same thing. That’s why it seems like its oversaturated, because you have so many people trying one thing.

Matt: They get stuck on this one sound, and kept going with it.

Julio: It’s important for people, like I said, to just be open-minded, and try other shit. Being popular is one thing, but making something original is another.

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