Chromatics - Cherry

Non-slave labor waged sugar, locally sourced spices from seasonal gardens, and everything dream-popped. These were the ingredients chosen to create the perfect little girl.

It is the fate of every self-conscious hipster since time immemorial. It is the burden we must carry. A pain so Sisyphean yet intrinsic to the artisanal craft of musical hipsterism, that the only way to quell the bleeding heart of its occurrence, is to pretend that it didn't even happen in the first place. To ignore the glory that is placed upon the falsified discoveries of Christopher Columbus, for the humble and solemn knowledge that he is the Leif Erickson of lightly blogged about music, and had been privy to this untamed landscape far before the masses of Spaniards had descended upon it, destroying it with their ignorance. The Moirai had sewn the ancient scrawling's into his locally sourced hemp pullover, but even with that warning, he did not know that the anguish would be so severe. When a man finds a song that few other have, it is like eyeing the tangible love that emanates from the fresh, rosy cheeked face of a newborn first son. It is a beautiful feeling, with nary a comparative. Yet, as with any craft of hipsterism, it can be destroyed so easily, as the plebeians come foaming at the mouth in their hordes to ravage the once secret village, and make tons of shitty remixes on their Mac's with Fruity Loops, with an added terribly tempo-shifted Wiz Khalifa verse, once they catch wind that the song exists. What can one do, but move along, and try to shield their eyes from the madness... The shrill and whirling violin chords come in and snap the hipster back into reality. He is laying half naked on his bed, laptop covering his long-neglected crotch, and the heat radiation egressing from it ensure that it will stay that way.

What I'm trying to say in layman's terms is, could I be any more pretentious, AND that I heard this song a long time ago, and I told all my friends to listen to it, and they didn't, and now it's going to be famous, and they're all going to come to me and tell me they heard this song and that I should step my music game up. It is a normal occurrence, and one that, as I said, destroys the fabric of a hipster's heart, though they'd never admit it. It is intrinsic to the label as can be. A heavy heart indeed. Let me explain.

Reverb soaked, pastel hazed, dream pop act. I have never heard this before.

The Chromatics are an electronic music band formed in 2001 and hailing from Portland, Oregon, home of dying hipsters, seasonal foodstuffs, and crippling depression. The band consists of Ruth Radelet (vocals/synthesizer), Adam Miller (guitar/vocoder), Nat Walker (drums/synthesizer), and Johnny Jewel (producer, multi-instrumentalist). I took that from Wikipedia and there's nothing you can do about it, bitch. According to the world's largest multilingual free-content encyclopedia on the Internet, the band originally featured a trademark sound indebted to punk rock and lo-fi, but after numerous lineup changes, which left guitarist Adam Miller as the sole original member, the band began releasing material on the Italians Do It Better record label in 2007 with a more dream-pop oriented sound that kept the lo-fi roots, but eschewed the punk for a more contemporary and sensual sonic landscape (we use big words that mean nothing here). They've got a couple of EP's and 4 albums as a whole, as well as assorted singles scattered throughout their career, and the band's music has even been featured on films like Drive and Taken, as well as shows like Gossip Girl (which is actually quality television. No. Seriously...). They've got a lot of great, and even semi-popular records that I could have written about, but my favorite, and the topic of this particular Track Genius post, is the song "Cherry".

So technically this isn't the official music video for the song, this one is, but it is probably the best visualization for it, as beautiful hipsters run around in a vintage black and white film filter, while they enjoy life over bubbly pop music, escaping from the existential dread and relationship oriented heartbreak that they give to each other. In reality, it's a commercial for fucking jeans. But you wouldn't really be able to tell that by yourself, and it's directed by hipster-girl heartthrob James Franco (just check any pubescent teenage girl's Tumblr for proof) for the terribly named "Seven For All Mankind Jeans" brand, the "leader in premium denim". What that really means is that they have a product called "Paxtyn Tapered Skinny in Washed Out Destroyed" jeans for $218.00 American dollars. Naw son. Not about that life, at all. Regardless of the message to buy overpriced, already used jeans (notice how they don't even try to hide that fact, since "washed out & destroyed" is literally in the title of the fucking product) the music video is quite good. I wouldn't expect anything less from a company that gave a ton of money, artistic free reign, and a camera to James Franco, who was probably on dimethyltryptamine when shooting this. As for the song, what we're really here for, it is really good. It's got all the trappings of a dream-pop rock song, with the a groovy and repetitive baseline, crescendoing snare pattern, and aerated synth stylings. Lest we forget the reverb soaked vocals of lead singer Ruth Radelet, the lyrics bring about an ominous sexuality when coupled with the video, but that probably should have been obvious with the title of the song. It's about love and heartbreak and longing, as most things in this life are, but it still sounds fresh, which, most things in this life are not *I clench the unbalanced sawed off between my weakly muscular legs, barrel facing toward my head, big toe on the trigger, continuing to type on my computer*.

Fish lens for my real friends & lens fish for my fish friends.

So, why did I end up posting about this song instead of all the other Track Genius posts I had been writing? It's simple. The hipster inside of me came raging out when I heard today that a favorite rapper of mine, Schoolboy Q, would be sampling the track wholeheartedly on a record off his upcoming album "Oxymoron". The video for "Bitch, Don't Kill My Vibe" by Schoolboy Q's label-mate Kendrick Lamar dropped today, and a secret Director's Cut of the video, ends with a snippet from the untitled track. You can peep it at 5:05, but you should probably watch the whole video since Kendrick Lamar and this song are both awesome.

            
          

So, why did I start such a fuss at the beginning of this post? Well, I told everyone to listen to this song a long time ago! Hell, near when it came out actually, and up until now I've been telling people to check it out. I can tell the Schoolboy Q song is gonna be a hit and a summer radio smash, what with the catchy Chromatics melody and Q's inexplicable charm and uncanny ear for making awesome pop-rap tracks. I may sound incredibly bitchy (I do sound incredibly bitchy*), but I'm actually quite glad both this song and Schoolboy Q are going to get a lot more exposure when Oxymoron comes out. Big ups to everyone. Because remember Track Genius readers, what few of you there are. We're about love here. YUNG PEEPLE MUSIC YO! That's all I really have to say about my crippling hipsterism (can one really be a hipster if they are self-aware or does that defy ironic labeling?) and my love for this track. You can check out more from the Chromatics on their Facebook, Soundcloud, Label Page, or, as always, on Pitchfork.

As always, please share, enjoy, and spread the love. Peace.