Bryson Tiller's 'Experimental' Album Comes with a Message: 'Only Way You Can Grow Is by Being Uncomfortable' (Exclusive)

From 'GTA' influences to his eldest daughter being "tapped in" to his music now, the multi-platinum musician details his latest project to PEOPLE

Bryson Tiller needs little introduction, but allow him to make one again.

It’s been a week since the 31-year-old R&B star released his self-titled album, Bryson Tiller, or BTA for short. He’s currently on the road, promoting it in the U.K. And while he has fans to see all over the world, there’s a few locations responsible for his sound that he can’t tour — specifically the fictional cities of Liberty City, Vice City and Los Santos.

The album, Tiller says, is not only a disruption from what his listeners may be used to, but it’s also a nod to the influence of Grand Theft Auto — the video game franchise with in-game radio stations that he now credits as “the reason why I love so many different genres of music.” BTA is certainly an expression of that love.

“They only loaded up those radio stations with 10, maybe 15 songs. I'd be on the R&B station, the country music station, the hard rock station. That's what opened me up to being able to like so many different genres,” Tiller tells PEOPLE over the phone while on tour.

Like most kids in the early aughts, he “had to sneak and play” Grand Theft Auto 3 to catch a sample of the music that soundtracked the game. But those radio stations left a lasting impression on Tiller, an artist who now channels that same freedom of an open-world video game into his latest effort.

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Bryson Tiller is just as much an “experimental” effort as it is a departure from his multi-platinum 2015 debut Trapsoul, Tiller says. Titled to represent his signature blend of hip-hop and R&B, Trapsoul may have been largely responsible for the formation of his fanbase, but this time around (now four albums in), Tiller wanted to “challenge myself” by focusing primarily on his singing.

“I'm barely rapping on this album at all just because I wanted to be uncomfortable,” Tiller admits. “I think that's making some of my fans uncomfortable. Then some of my other fans, they're eating it right up, and I appreciate them for that.”

“For me, just like in the gym, the only way you can grow is by being uncomfortable,” he adds.

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Tiller’s push to try something new in BTA comes off in its finished product — a 19-track record that pairs him with several acclaimed producers and songwriters (Boi-1da, Leon Thomas, D’Mile, Kaytranada), treats listeners to atmospheric vocal moments in tracks such as “Waterfalls,” and reconnects him with Grammy champ Victoria Monét for their innuendo-filled bop “Persuasion.”

“I've never collaborated on anything before, I've always written every song by myself,” Tiller says of his songwriting process pre-BTA. “[For this album], we was having these kitchen sessions where we would go in there, we'd turn the microphone on, we'd play 100, 200 beats, and then we find the beat that we liked the most and we'd all write to it together and just try different melodies and have some drinks. Those studio sessions were definitely some of the best — no, not even some of — they were the best studio sessions that I've ever had.”

Related: Victoria Monét Talks 'Jaguar II,' Motherhood, Perfectionism: 'Rather Be Underrated than Overrated' (Exclusive)

As for his musical connection to Monét — with whom he previously hopped on a remix last year — Tiller says it all started when he first spun her 2020 project Jaguar.

After he realized that Monét’s music was so "soothing" that it actually helped him fall asleep when he needed to, he “called her up” and they got to work. Tiller then asked Monét to send over some music — specifically stuff she's “not used to hearing me on.”

“She played [‘Persuasion’] for me, and right away I loved it just because, not even necessarily for how it sounded right away, but it was more-so the writing. Because nobody writes songs like that,” he says.

“Nobody writes anything that's that clever anymore,” Tiller adds of their collab, which playfully toys with almost using profanity throughout. “For somebody to make you think they're going to say something and they say something completely different. I mean, if there's another song like that, somebody could please just point me in that direction so I could listen to it. But I'm pretty sure that this was one of the first times it's ever been done. I was just super excited to get on it.”

A father of two, Tiller’s eldest daughter is also getting old enough to really understand her dad’s job — and she too is already a fan of the new album. As he explains, his 10-year-old Harley is already gravitating toward tracks “Undertow” and “Assume the Position.”

“She has Apple Music, and yeah, she's been tapped in, tuning into my album,” he says. “And she texts me and tells me she's so excited. She watches all my performances.”

Performing around the world and recording as frequently as he has in recent years, Tiller admits that he’s still searching for a balance of family life and work. “I haven't really found a good balance for that yet, especially just because I feel like I've been trying to climb back to where I feel like I need to be,” he explains.

“So who knows, maybe it'll be different from here on out now that I have this album out. This was really important for me, because now I feel a bit more free to do whatever the hell I please," he says.

Even a decade in, Tiller is also still adjusting to the downsides that come with his line of work, particularly criticism from listeners. “We do have one life on this earth, man, and I feel like people should do what makes them happy, and music does make me happy for the most part. But I have to be honest, it is pretty draining to record music... for people just to tell me that it sucks. Regardless of whether I believe it's true or not, it's still draining,” he says.

Still, Tiller is proud of the risks he's taken on the new album, and is also eyeing a new creative outlet that channels what connected him to so many genres of music in the first place: Gaming. Just last year, the multi-hyphenate announced his company Trapsoul Games, and with his reconnected love of the medium, he promises to channel his love for story-telling into something fresh.

“I've always had several ideas for video games and, more than anything, I love to tell stories. So that's how I got into music, just because I wanted to tell stories,” he says. “So now, I was like, ‘This is going to be my new form of storytelling through video games.’ So I'm really excited.”

While Tiller didn’t reveal too much about his game design work, he also shares that he loves “the idea of the future” — something that shines through on the sounds and visuals behind his latest effort. And in Tiller's own future, he knows he'll be reflecting fondly on this new album.

“When I’m older and I look back on it, I'm going to be like, ‘Man, I was really being myself on this album, and I really did everything... It's all me,” he says. “I feel like if people don't like that, then they just don't like me, and that's OK with me because the people who do like that stuff or like me for just being myself will show themselves.”

“[When I look at the album before this] I feel like I was limping, just trying to get used to walking again. With this album, the Bryson Tiller album, I'm just full-on sprinting.”

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