What are you dreaming of these days? I find myself wishing for the small things – the sunlight that wakes me, the warmth that gives everyday life its quiet beauty. Flat Days, the new song by Twin Toes, opens exactly that question: the waiting for something you long for, something you hope will finally appear. The reply you’re waiting for from someone special, the face you hope to see again, or the wave that carries you forward. Whatever it may be. Warm, dreamy, and gently floating, the track feels made for these in-between days, inviting you to pause, feel and listen.
Twin Toes is the collaboration of Nico and Antoine, two musicians whose paths meet somewhere between Belgian indie, French songwriting and a shared fascination for surfing’s slow rhythm. Their music often moves between stillness and motion – shaped by everyday moments, small philosophies, and the contrast between longing and letting go. As they told us in our conversation: “Life, surfing, music – it’s about waiting for the right moment.” In our interview, we spoke about surfing as a kind of compass, the challenges of releasing music in today’s landscape, and the humor that runs through everything they do.
photography by Simon Vanrie
Hey dear Nico and Antoine, I’m listening to your new track Flat Days right now — I love this floating vibe. The song is about that moment when we’re waiting for something — the wave, or anything else in life, right?
Yes, absolutely. We’re musicians but also surfers for about four and a half years now. We have a lot in common with Nico, in music of course but also in life. And funnily enough, we both got back into surfing at the same moment in our lives. We were hooked when we were younger, and it’s strange, but we reconnected with that passion thanks to the North Sea in Belgium. Since then, it’s rare not to think about it. That’s why we wanted to explore the theme of waiting in this song. Life, surfing, music — that’s what it is. It’s about waiting for the right moment. It’s about knowing when to seize it.
And it’s also an ode to daydreaming and letting go. Why was it important for you to write a song about this feeling?
Surfing is kind of an obsession for the two of us, right? And we live in Belgium, definitely a flat sea country where waves only show up a handful of times a year. It’s very frustrating. But in a way, it’s also a good life lesson. Letting go becomes a survival mechanism. For us it’s surfing, for someone else it’ll be something completely different.
Do you find it hard to wait for something yourselves — like, would you say you’re impatient?
Impatience is something that’s very present in our childhood. The older we get, the more we learn to control that feeling. I’m not sure it’s really an improvement, though. It’s important to stay impatient. As for us, I wouldn’t say we are. But when there are waves, we certainly won’t be standing behind our guitars and microphones. (laughs)
Were you somewhere near the beach when writing the song?
And are you surfers yourselves? If yes: what’s the biggest life lesson the waves have taught you?
We wrote the song while on a surf trip in Finistère, Brittany, where there are beautiful waves basically every day. It felt like a real release after a long wave famine back home.
We’re both North Sea surfers and we regularly go surfing together. We started around the same time, so we share the passion on the same level. The waves have taught us humility. When you start surfing, there’s no cheating, no shortcuts. You have to be bad at it for a while before you can even hope to have a bit of style on a board. But that’s the whole point, enjoying the journey. Even getting tossed around in the white foam on a stormy winter day is fun for us. It makes us feel alive.
“The real challenge is figuring out how to find our place in today’s music scene.”
In August you celebrated your 5th birthday together as Twin Toes. How did the two of you meet, and was it immediately clear that you wanted to make music together?
Five years!! It’s crazy. We met after a Wuman concert, one of Nico’s former bands. I went up to him to say that I really liked his guitar playing. He wrote to me the next day to say he had listened to my record and that he thought it was cool too. Then we kept running into each other through different projects, and the idea of starting a band together just came naturally. No regrets on my side. (laughs)
And what were each of your paths into music?
Antoine had a pretty successful career as a French singer-songwriter with what you could call a hit (Fou), which was on the radio all the time here at home. Later, he moved toward a more indie sound, mixing French lyrics with influences from Bon Iver.
Nico comes from the indie side of the Belgian music scene. He had a math-rock band (Perils of Penelope) as a teenager, then later an experimental indie band (WUMAN).
We both also have solo projects: Antoine Chance and Tatête, where we explore more minimalist approaches. Twin Toes is our playground, the place where we can go full throttle and push all the weird ideas. And that’s super fun.
What’s the story behind your band name?
The almost unbelievable story behind our band’s name is… well, quite painful. We showed up at the studio after a weekend, and it turned out we had both broken the same toe on the same foot — the index toe on the left foot.
And do you actually bring that huge foot with you to all your concerts? (I see it in your Instagram posts so often — (laughs))
(laughs) Yes, at least we used to. For practical reasons, we’ve done a few shows without it recently. Our setup is really light, so without the foot we can tour in a Fiat 500. With the foot, we need a van… which is beautifully absurd and very typically Belgian.
“We don’t take much too seriously anyway. It’s a bit of a life philosophy.”
I also feel a lot of humor when I look at your Instagram. Does humor play a role in your live shows too and in life in general?
Yes, I almost forgot, that’s true. Music, surfing, and humor. We should probably add food too, if we want to be completely honest. Bringing a bit of quirkiness into an indie music project is something we enjoy. We don’t think of ourselves as making humorous music, but it’s a kind of freedom we like to take, because it’s not used very often. And we don’t take much too seriously anyway. It’s a bit of a life philosophy.
What are the biggest challenges for you when you work together?
Morning breath. (laughs)
More seriously, making music together is actually quite smooth. The real challenge is figuring out how to release new music, how to put ourselves out there and find our place in today’s music scene. We feel a bit lost, honestly: Spotify algorithms, TikTok content that doesn’t really inspire us, festivals taking fewer risks, fewer shows in general… It’s not an easy time for developing bands like Twin Toes. At least from our experience here in Belgium.
What inspires you when making music — does a certain environment influence you, or other art forms, or does the music come more from personal moods and experiences?
I think absolutely everything inspires us. For example, we’re very fed by cinema. We really love the scores of musicians like Emile Mosseri, Jon Brion, and Michael Andrews.
Composing the music for an A24 film would be an absolute dream for us.
We recommend listening to the soundtrack of Miranda July’s film Me and You and Everyone We Know. It’s inspiring and makes you want to compose music in that style. But it also gives you the confidence to create something completely different, yet still shaped by the emotion the film gives you.
Can you already tell us something about your upcoming EP? Is there a core theme?
Sure! We’re really excited to bring these songs to life. We already released a first single, Born Before the Internet, and more will follow after Flat Days. The EP is a collection of six tracks bouncing between indie pop and hyperpop — music for softies, but with enough sub and kick to make your booty move from time to time.
And lastly — what did you want to be when you were kids?
I think we both wanted to be musicians pretty early on. We’re lucky to be able to do it. Before I connected with that idea, I personally wanted to become a ‘mattress tester’.
Follow Twin Toes for more:
www.instagram.com/wearetwintoes
