Nathan Joseph Mendes (born 2 June 2001), known professionally as Tsumyoki[a] (or simply Yoki), is an Indian rapper, singer-songwriter, and record producer.
He credits his mother and family for supporting him throughout his musical career and considers artists like XXXTentacion, Juice WRLD, Drake, Eminem, Post Malone, Ski Mask the Slump God and Michael Jackson as his role models.
He discusses the difficulties he encountered when trying to establish himself in the rap scene, recounting instances of waiting outside clubs with a USB flash drive containing his music in the hopes of catching the attention of popular artists.
In addition, he notes the lack of widespread backing for indigenous musicians in Goa who crafted their own music, requiring him to work towards gaining visibility.
[11] In November 2020, Tsumyoki produced "Ketta" referring to an "action of ditching or avoiding someone", a single track by Carisio Azavedo mononymously known as Bongisio, a Merces based music artist which was mastered and recorded by 2jaym.
Before Tsumyoki embarked on his music career, he lacked any Goan rappers to serve as influences since there were no popular artists in that category during that period.
[12] On 4 September 2021, Tsumyoki released his 15-minute maiden EP, "Way Too Messy", it included five tracks with themes of cancel culture, ambition and self discovery.
The inspiration behind it was when he and Daniel Sequeira professionally known as Kidd Mange, were invited to the Gully Gang camp, wherein they were involved in making music.
Together with nine local artists,[13] they used this platform to raise awareness about significant challenges such as the Mollem situation affecting the region of Goa.
They are best known for their 2021 album 'Daboij', which features a mix of genres such as pop, rock, indie, R&B/soul, hip- hop, rap, and trap music.
[14] The band also mentioned that XXXTentacion, Tyler, the Creator, MF Doom, Anson Seabra, J. Cole, Juice Wrld, Lauv and Nucleya were some of their inspirations for each of their tracks.