Malcolm Todd
Malcolm Todd, born September 15, 2003, in Los Angeles, is a singer-songwriter and producer who grew up between his mother's world of musical theater and Stevie Wonder records and his father's folk and classic-rock LPs. He went viral on TikTok in 2023 with the singles 'Art House' and 'Roommates', signed to Columbia, and released the 2024 mixtape 'Sweet Boy' before his 2025 self-titled debut album and its breakout single 'Chest Pain (I Love)'. His sound folds bedroom-pop intimacy, guitar-forward alternative R&B, and soul-schooled melody into loose, warm, genre-blurring songs.
Todd has repeatedly named Steve Lacy as his hero and credited Lacy with making him want to make music, and he openly embraces being called 'the white Steve Lacy'; you hear it in his lo-fi, guitar-driven take on alternative R&B, where a bedroom-scaled recording carries a full pop song. (Lacy would later add bass, guitar, and backing vocals to Todd's 'Do That Again'.)
listen forCue Lacy's woozy, self-produced 'Dark Red' and then Todd's 'Chest Pain (I Love)' — both hang a lovesick, falsetto-leaning vocal over a warm, slightly detuned guitar figure and a soft, unhurried groove rather than a big drop.
Todd has cited Dominic Fike among the alternative-R&B and bedroom-pop artists who inspired him, and the two share a Columbia-era template: short, genre-fluid songs that slide between sung and half-rapped delivery over bright, guitar-tinged pop.
listen forPut Fike's breezy, acoustic-bounce 'Well fair enough' hook on '3 Nights' next to Todd's 'Doll' — both ride a light, strummed pop lilt and a conversational, sing-song vocal cadence that keeps flipping between rapping and crooning.
By Todd's own account his mother, who worked in musical theater, raised him on Stevie Wonder, and that soul grounding shows up in his fondness for warm, extended chords and syncopated, groove-first arrangements rather than four-square pop.
listen forPlay Wonder's swaggering, clavinet-funk 'I Wish' and then Todd's 'Concrete' — listen for the same reliance on a springy, syncopated pocket and soul-colored chord changes to carry the song, with the vocal floating up into a light falsetto over the top.