Taco on 21st-Century Creativity, Kindness and Really "Not Giving a F*ck"

Odd Future‘s DJ Taco, aka Travis Bennet, is a well-connected figure among today’s millennial creatives. In a recent interview with SSENSE, Taco talked Odd Future, keeping his private life separate from his social media, his internet beef with Deadmau5, crying at his sister Syd‘s performances, following Tyler, The Creator‘s no-flexing ethos and the importance of kindness, amongst other things.

When someone asks what you do, how do you respond?
I usually just say I DJ because that’s the simplest way to put it. Somebody always needs something though, whatever city they’re in, and that may sound kind of shady, but I mean a guitar player, or if somebody wants a song with somebody else, or likes a brand they don’t know anything about, I may have a connection. I have a pretty big network, so it’s not hard to help somebody out with shit. I do it out of love for whoever asked me.

Why did Deadmau5 block you?
F*ck him! He was on Twitter complaining about some shit, and I said something like, “Why are you complaining? You sound like a 13-year-old girl,” and he blocked me. Everytime I see him he’s trying to be super nice but it’s like, dude, I just want to slap you out of your shoes, that’s it. I could give a f*ck!
I don’t take disrespect lightly. Especially when it’s coming from someone who’s in a position above someone else. I admire his whole movement and what he did, but f*ck him as a person. The universe is very fair, and I think he probably has something he can’t pay to fix, and it’s going to hurt him forever. It’s okay because I’m confident in myself and my life’s okay. Life is amazing actually.

You mention girls you have crushes on publicly, is it weird when you meet them IRL?
No, I don’t even know if they see it, so who gives a f*ck? There have been girls that I’ve been with and they saw things from way back and were like, “What the f*ck? When did you post this?” Usually they’re kind of flattered because a lot of people won’t do that. Most people crush in private. F*ck that, I like your face and when I meet you in person, I’m going to tell you. It’s an insecurity for people to go talk to other people. I have that fear too but I push myself to say f*ck it and go have that conversation. Worse comes to worst, they’ll look at me like I’m crazy and walk away. Then I’ll continue my life without thinking about it twice.

What do you think Odd Future’s legacy is?
I don’t think it’s a NWA or Wu-Tang type of thing. People will say somebody’s the next Kobe Bryant, or the next Michael Jordan, or the next Lebron James. We were the first of our kind—people really doing whatever the f*ck we wanted. Motherfuckers were so into one style of thing. We opened everybody’s eyes to look at the world a little differently.
We were the first black kids in this generation to say, “We’re different and it’s okay.” We just don’t care. Everybody loves to say I don’t give a f*ck but they really give a f*ck. We don’t have time for the f*ckery that you think we give a f*ck about. We looked like we always had a joke that you wanted to be inside on.

From Odd Future to your friendship with Kendall Jenner, what have you learned from being on the inside? What do people get wrong?
Everybody thinks that people aren’t humans almost. Everyone wipes their ass at the end of the day. We’re all normal humans here.
People treat other people like products and that’s what I don’t like. That’s nasty—treating a human like they’re a product is very sleazy. Motherf*ckers cry, motherf*ckers be smiling, motherf*ckers get mad. All I’ve learned from being around is just be yourself and don’t be a dick. That’s it. Be yourself, don’t be a dick, and, oh yeah, don’t be weird.

Read the full interview at SSENSE. For related news, The Internet’s Syd reveals why Odd Future broke up.