“I try to write from a place of truth, even if it’s through a cartoonish filter,” says Justin Fuller, the Los Angeles based songwriter and producer behind Hunter Paris. “I always want to relate to my own music at least.” As a self-taught musician and visual artist, Fuller has created a rich body of work through his alter ego, Hunter Paris, which highlights his ardent songwriting and dynamic production sensibilities. Fuller initially began recording and releasing music online as a teenager under various pseudonyms like Axel Akari—Fuller even recalls, “I was DJ Black Kid in middle school"—and has remained a founding member of his high school art clique, The Primal Boys, since 2014. Fuller has shared only a fraction of his music and art online, admitting, “I have real imposters syndrome and I always feel like I don’t work hard enough.” But with the encouragement of his peers and strangers on the internet, Justin began Hunter Paris in 2017 to bridge his creative practices and forge a new sound and vision he best described as “an aesthetic that’s somewhere between my two favorite movies, Paris, Texas and Good Burger.”

Music and design have been a comforting escape for Fuller while moving around Los Angeles and maintaining a full time job throughout his early 20s. “I’ve got to say… you really can’t make music off a couch,” Fuller says light heartedly, reflecting on the tracks he produced during a year he spent couch surfing. “My workflow has changed a lot. I used to be recording songs every day, but even though I can’t do that now, I think the work I do have time to do is more productive, haha.” Fuller’s process employs the spontaneous resourcefulness of punk and hip-hop, with the concise attention to detail of a master craftsman. Inspired by prolific songwriters like Stevie Wonder and Elliott Smith, as well as auteur performers like FKA Twigs and Kanye West, Fuller aspires to defy expectations and produce honest work on his own terms. His most recent string of singles released at the end of 2019, including “Georgia,” “2006,” “Cranberry Juice,” and “Buttercup,” were all conceived and completed a week apart. “Something about my friends telling me that I’m running out of time helped push me to finish a song a week for a month before the year ended.” Like many artists before him, Fuller thrives within self-imposed limitations and rises to the occasion under pressure. 

Fuller has come a long way from his 2017 debut For Crying Out Loud, and is eager to expand the scope of Hunter Paris from his new home on the LA indie label Danger Collective Records. Playing off his child-like sense of humor and refined taste, Fuller hopes to share a dimension of himself through Hunter Paris that he has not always been able to easily share. Fuller says, “Making music has helped me feel more comfortable expressing myself and better understand who I am. Hopefully getting the courage to share more of it can help listeners do the same for themselves.”