EKOH & ARANKAI
By Raechel Elyse
The Social - Orlando, FL - November 20th, 2025
Backstage in Orlando, I sat down with Jeff - better known as Ekoh, and Oscar (Arankai) as they caught
their breath after their impactful sets; another cultivating night of The Broken Heart Collector Tour. As
fans pack venues and their collaborative track gains momentum, the two artists talk about tour life,
where they started, and how it’s been seeing how far they’ve both come.
Q: This question is for both of you, what was the moment you realized that music could be a career
instead of a hobby?
A: Jeff - My bank account told me. Yeah, yeah, that was it. I never thought it would ever be anything
more than a hobby until my bank account was like hey actually that's not true and then every month I
still feel like is that really happening?
Oscar - I was actually on tour with Archers and I was working full-time and we had a little bit of time
off for this run and then on a whim I just checked DistroKid and I was like I wonder if this even did
anything and I was like there's money! I could get paid for this? I didn't even know you get paid for
this and I was like oh oh that's cool! It's not like I was like oh shucks. If people like it this much
maybe, just maybe I'll put out another one. So I put out another one and it worked again and I'm like I
think I'm just gonna keep doing this. Yeah it also kind of worked out to the point where my schedule
touring just got so heavy that I had to leave my job. I was like well what am I gonna do because as
you understand rock bands don't make a lot of money so I was like well I'm gonna do this Arankai
thing and I hope that it makes this much because that's what I need to live and then it made that much
and a little bit more so then I just kept doing it.
Q: Do you have a difficulty balancing the Archers stuff with Arankai?
A: Oscar - Not until recently. It's been a bit of a struggle because both projects are going straight up,
which is sick but it's also got its own challenges where it's like all right I need time to go in the studio
to write, Archer's needs time to go to the studio to write but also in the middle of that Archer's is also
on tour five months out of the year six months out of the year and so it's like which one gets served
first and trying to balance both has been pretty challenging only recently, up until then it's like it's
been me in my apartment yelling at a microphone.
Q: What do you think people misunderstand the most about you or your music?
A: Jeff - I come from the hip-hop world so as soon as you say “I rap” people immediately misjudge
you as just a rapper and they think they know exactly what you're about or what your content is or
what your substance is and so you kind of like walk into every situation with a strike against you and
in a lot of scenarios, especially being a white rapper you know... definitely don't fuck with like white
rappers in a lot of cases. So having to like step in with that and especially with the music I've been
making lately is not very rap centric there's rap elements but it leans more to the heavier side is trying
to sway people's opinions of what they thought of me or what they currently think of me just walking
into a room and being like no this isn't what I am this is what I am I'm more about the substance than
the way it's packaged and presented.
Q: What scares you both most about being an artist and having to have this public image?
A: Oscar - Don't fuck up. Every show matters and what you put out on the stage will be immortalized,
thank you internet, and so like the pressure's on. You can't just go up there and be like all right I'm
gonna do my thing, bye. You have to go up there and you've got to believe it like it's the first and last
show you're ever gonna play, because if you leave it all on that dance floor and if you got something
left in the tank it means you did it wrong. So it's the pressure's on to put on a good show especially
when the caliber is you got an NF and Monsters that put on crazy performances you got Bad Omens
and I Prevail, these are the kinds of shows people go to see and it's like cool that's the threshold. It's
go time when you go on stage so I'm always a little bit like “oh no please don't let me fail.”
Q: How has that been for you going from doing tik-toks in 2020 to being on stage and touring?
A: Oscar - It's been strange. I'm from a very small town I was raised on a farm and I for sure never
thought of myself as any sort of like influencer and I just knew how to play music it was the thing that
I did and going from being like hey instead of just jamming with your friends now you're touring the
country now you've gone overseas and now you're doing your own music, oh also by the way now
you're gonna sing it. That's to kind of feel like a boy thinking about it sometimes because I think it's
so weird and it's so wild that it's a very unreal feeling. It doesn't even feel like it's my life. I'm like
watching somebody else's crazy sitcom.
Q: You just had a new song and music video drop. How was the writing process for that?
A: Jeff - I mean the writing process for the song was I had, had that track for a long time I was kind of
sitting on and didn't really know what to do with it or where to go with it and I thought I had writer's
block but I don't think writers block really exists. I think you just haven't figured out what you need to
say. I think that's the block. It's just you haven't really been vulnerable enough I guess and there was a
piece of me that was kind of over being so obvious in my lyrics about what I was talking about. I can
only talk about my life descriptively so many times. How can I talk about something and make it a
little more abstract so I've been dealing with things like my brother passing and I've been sober for a
long time. I just started having cravings again, I want to check out for the first time in a long time and
have that voice kind of talking again and that yeah that's kind of where that song came from. There's
like a window of time any addict knows that a craving lasts for and in that window of time it's like the
danger zone of like what do I do, how do I not give into this, where do I go, what's happening and
that's kind of where the music video came from. It's like setting a clock and this thing trying to take
hold of you.
Q: Do you guys have a favorite song right now to play live?
A: Oscar - Broken heart collector
Jeff- Broken heart collector for sure.
Oscar- I really enjoyed playing that one, it's like getting to work with Jeff and just jump on the stage
do our thing and have fun. That's what this entire tour has been, it's just been fun.
Jeff- It's cool because there's like fans that just know Arankai and fans just getting to know me, and
then there's fans that know me and just getting to know Arankai. Then when we do broken heart
collector it's like the entire Venn diagram meets. It's like the coolest moment you know?
Be sure to catch them on tour if they are performing in your area! They have dates across the
US from now until December 16th. Make sure to check out Ekoh's new song and music video
Lithium and Arankai’s latest song Dead Throne.
https://ekohmusic.com/pages/tour
https://iamarankai.com/
